


A Bird in the Hand

by Enterprisingly



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi (2017), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Background GingerPilot, Ben Solo: Lumberjack Romance Daydream, Birds, Camping, Drama, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Ensemble Cast, F/M, Falconer Ben, Falconer Rey, Falconry, Families of Choice, Humor, Multi, Okay it's actually more like Medium Burn, Poor Life Choices, Redeemed Ben Solo, Romance, Sharing A Tent, Skywalker Family Drama, Slow Burn, The Bizarrely Specific AU I Was Born To Write, background finnrose - Freeform, the Millennium Falcon as an Actual Falcon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-15
Updated: 2019-01-07
Packaged: 2019-09-19 14:28:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 21,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17003397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Enterprisingly/pseuds/Enterprisingly
Summary: Ben Solo, the disgraced prodigal son of falconry legends, comes to the annual California Falconry Association field meet on a mission to debut a new piece of raptor training technology that could change the entire sport forever – if he could just get anyone to try it, that is.But when Ben forgets his tent poles Han offers up Rey’s tent to share, unaware that his former apprentice has been holding a grudge against his son for the last five years. As tension between the two of them heats up, it becomes clear that the first person Ben needs to win over is Rey, otherwise his revolutionary new idea will, quite literally, never get off the ground.





	1. Falconry

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to my new Reylo AU! I’ve wanted to write a story about falconry for a while now and even though I know this isn’t really something that most people are going to be familiar with, I do hope you’ll give it a shot!
> 
> Notes:  
> 1\. Falconry is the partnership between a human and a bird of prey where the human gets to assist and observe up close the natural behavior of the bird. That means hunting. It is NOT trophy hunting, but it’s hunting all the same. The ultimate goal with falconry is to have your bird catching enough food to feed itself year round. I will NOT be describing hunts in graphic detail, but this is a story about people who keep and work with hunting birds. You have been forewarned.  
> 2\. This story is currently slated to be 4-5 chapters long but since I have no self control and I LOVE BIRDS who even knows. I’ve got my outline but we all know how that went with Play To Win.  
> 3.While all actual falconry information is factual in here I have fudged a few things about the world of falconry itself for storytelling purposes. For example: the drone Ben has invented here is already in existence and widely in use in reality.
> 
> Massive thanks to my partner in crime, [cyborgharpy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cyborgharpy) for betaing this fic and [violetwilson](https://archiveofourown.org/users/violetwilson) for the sanity check halfway through. These ladies give me strength and I am so grateful to both of them! Thanks are also due to Erulisse17 from the Writing Den for letting me ask ALL the NorCal geography questions!

**Falconry**

> _noun_
> 
> Also known as Hawking. The sport of hunting with falcons or other birds of prey; the keeping and training of such birds.
> 
>  

* * *

 

Han says that falconry is the oldest sport in the world. The ‘ _sport of kings_ ’. It’s about the thrill of the chase and the pride in a successful hunt.

Leia says that falconry is more of an art; an age old partnership between humans and birds of prey, fueled by dreams of flight and a passion for the beauty of nature in all her splendor and cruelty alike.

Rey privately thinks that falconry is actually a kind of madness that overtakes certain people and makes them do completely insane things in the name of their obsession with birds. Such as camping out on the hard ground at the roots of an ancient pine tree in the bitter chill of a Northern California November night, for _the second time in a week_ because her prized Peregrine Falcon Millennia won’t fucking _fly back to her glove_.

She’s tried everything; whistling, calling, holding out her arm with chicken tidbits in her grasp and then with a whole section of quail. She’d even tied said whole section of quail to Millie’s favorite lure – a flat leather sparrow attached to a length of nylon – and waved that around in the air for a while.

The first time Rey saw a lure in action, Millennia had been a very young bird – only just having grown in her adult plumage – and Han had invited Rey to join him out in the field while he flew her on the lure for exercise.

 _‘It’s easy,’_ Han had said, twirling the long nylon rope above his head like a circus performer. He’d kept the lure whirling and swinging around and around as the falcon had soared round the sky up above, diving and swooping, wings spread, legs outstretched, talons grasping at the air _just_ above her target, until she finally timed her attack just right, driving to the ground, prey clasped tightly in her feet.

Rey had found herself utterly captivated by the whole display. It was a dance. A magic trick. Something that felt primal and ancient and she desperately wanted to see it again.

 _‘The trick is to keep up the momentum, keep the lure moving and don’t let her grab it til she’s really worked for it,’_ Han tells her as he carefully trades Millie off of the lure and back onto his glove by offering a fresh tidbit, _‘Luring a bird is a game of keep away that the bird always wins. Thing is, you’ve gotta make sure they earn it or they’ll lose interest in the real hunt and you’ll end up with a nice glove ornament and not much else.’_

Tonight, however neither treats, nor luring, nor begging had worked and Rey had only worn herself out by spinning the lure around like a fool for almost an hour.

“You could be at home in your nice, warm mews, you know!” Rey calls to her wayward falcon, shivering despite her warm jacket and thermal undergarments, “Sound asleep on your favorite perch with a nice roof over your head!”

But much like everything else she’s tried, reasoning does little to convince Millie to come down. And in the end it is Rey who is forced to concede, accepting her fate.

Hours later, as her butt is going numb from sitting on the cold ground, Rey sighs and pulls her jacket tighter around her body. In the tree up above she hears the tell-tale rustle of Millie ruffling her feathers, and the soft jangle of the tracking bells attached to her anklets. She’s content, with a belly full of pigeon to stay exactly where she is in the gathering dark.

“Oh _bloody hell_. Fine. You win. At least _one_ of us is gonna get a good night’s sleep,” she mutters.

She knows that she’s going to have sap on her clothing – including her _favorite_ tan hunting pants – and pine needles stuck in her hair come morning, but at the very least there’s no snow on the ground and the weather is clear tonight.

The only response she gets is a contented peep and another ruffle. Rey sighs again and settles back against the tree to wait.

 

* * *

 

“That scar’s finally looking better,” Phasma says calls, as Ben climbs out of his massive black Dodge Ram pickup and shuts the door behind him. It’s beginning to show its age just a bit and the door squeaks a little on hinges that could definitely do with an oiling.

He gives her a flat look of displeasure as his black hunting boots sink into the damp ground with a squelch. He’s dressed warmly in a winter Hawking coat and windproof hiking trousers. The knit wool scarf around his neck keeps the worst of the chill from climbing into his clothes but he can instantly feel the tips of his ears and fingers growing cold.

Of _course_ it’s rainy and miserable the first time he goes on a falconry-related excursion since returning to the typically temperate and sunny Southern California. Even the weather is unhappy about him being here. It’s early December so it’s not _entirely_ surprising that the weather has turned sour but that doesn’t mean that he has to like it.

“Hello to you too, Phas,” he grumbles as he strides across the open field to join her where she’s leaning, legs and arms crossed, against the hood of her own truck – a gleaming white Chevy Silverado, brand new by the look of it – which is somehow still pristine despite the muddy state of the dirt road leading out to their current location.

Phasma is tall and muscular for a woman, nearly as large as Ben himself. Dressed head to toe in top of the line gray hunting gear she cuts quite a figure, not that Ben’s impressed. Wealthy British falconers are a dime-a-dozen in his experience.

She holds her hands up defensively as he draws even with her.

“I’m just saying! The last time I saw you, you looked like you’d lost a fight with a meat grinder which… isn’t actually that far from the truth. Taking a Harpy Eagle talon to the face! It’s a goddamn miracle you still have that eye.”

Ben’s hand flies up to touch the scar in question reflexively. It’s an uneven line that nearly bisects his face diagonally, beginning between his brows and carving its way down from his right cheek to his collarbone.

It _has_ healed quite a lot in the years since they last saw one another but it’s still there, a permanent reminder of his own hubris and the lowest point in his whole life.

Ben comes from a long line of American hawking royalty.

His grandfather, Anakin Skywalker had started the US Air Force falconry program, creating the grand tradition that had come to be emblematic of that branch of the armed forces.

His mother ran the most prestigious falconry school in the country and his father was a legendary hunter who routinely took home medals and trophies from field meets. Even his uncle Luke Skywalker had been the president of the California Falconry Association for 20 years. And given that in the world of use falconry, what the CFA said was considered as good as gospel… well.

His family name alone was enough to get any hawker worth their salt to sit up and pay attention.

After college, Ben had gone abroad in Scotland for a while, hoping to escape some of the pressure of expectation for him to live up to the family name. He’d spent most of that time working at a falconry center in a historic castle as an educator, which he had rather enjoyed. But even an ocean away, he couldn’t seem to shake the Skywalker legacy, and as he’d listened to even these far flug hawkers speak of his family’s name with reverence, a deep seated insecurity began to set in as he wondered: what could he ever do that could live up to the acomplishments of his predecessors?

It was the injured Harpy Eagle, who had arrived at the center to be rehabbed for a few weeks before being turned over to an international breeding program, that had finally given Ben an idea.

He had always been fascinated by Harpy Eagles. They were big, dangerous, and notoriously difficult to work with. Their flared crests and silver gray plumage made them look otherworldly and with a wingspan that could stretch well over six feet, they were a sight to behold.

They were also _never_ used as falconry birds.

Which would make taming one a perfect challenge for someone of his stock, then, he had reasoned.

Sometime around his twenty-third birthday, a few months after returning to the states, he’d stopped into his family’s ranch for a visit, intending to – begrudgingly – ask for their advice on his new project. But when he’d announced his intention to change that to his parents and uncle over a couple of beers, things had not gone according to plan.

 _‘The Skywalkers have always been the stuff of hawking legend. Why should I be any different?’_ he’d said, loftily, taking a sip of his own beer.

Han and Luke had shared a long, _knowing_ look and then burst into laughter, while Leia simply shook her head.

 _‘Oh, Ben…’_ she’d sighed.

 _‘You, kid? Train a Harpy Eagle?’_ Luke had asked, incredulous though peals of laughter, _‘I remember when you barely had enough patience to tame a Harris’s Hawk and those guys’ll are as easy as they come!’_

 _‘Come on, Ben,’_ Han had chided, _‘You’ve had some crazy ideas before but this one really takes the damn cake! You couldn’t train a Harpy if your life depended on it. Those birds would eat you alive, ears first!’_

Hot rage had flared in Ben’s gut, so fast and violent that it nearly made him sick. He’d grown somewhat accustomed to taking his family’s ‘teasing’ but for some reason this time he couldn’t dislodge the barbs. They sat underneath his skin, leaking poison into him.

Out in the field beyond the barn, Ben could see a gangly figure with a hawk perched on one hand and a brace of rabbits in the other striding towards the raptor facility with purpose. He recognized the figure as Rey, the orphan charity case his family had decided to take on – as if all the injured and unreleasable birds they were caring for at the sanctuary weren’t enough – who followed his father around with stars in her big hazel eyes.

 _‘Now_ that _girl’s really got a way with birds. Can’t believe she’s only been at this a year,’_ Luke had said, gesturing out to her silhouette with his half-empty bottle. _‘Maybe you should ask her for a few lessons before you go off chasing your Harpy Dreams.’_

Ben had chugged the rest of his beer and slammed the bottle down on the table hard enough that it made his relatives jump a little in surprise.

 _‘Fuck you all,’_ he spat before storming off into the house.

A year later, he’d been standing on a stage at the United States Falconry Association Conference with Snoke, the Harpy Eagle perched on the heaviest, thickest leather glove that money could buy, still feeling the pressure as the bird’s five inch talons dug into the material. Even sturdily built as he was, he could the weight of the bird made his muscles strain and shake a little.

The audience was rapt before him as Ben spoke about his process studying, acquiring, and training the eagle, and despite the fact that he had to keep ducking his head as Snoke attempted to lunge at his face, he’d been proud of what his very presence there ment. It didn’t occur to him that anything was wrong, at the time; his relationship with Snoke had always been a tempestuous one, but Ben was confident that with time that would change.

As he prepared for what everyone had really come for – a demonstration of free flight – he gave the audience a quick scan just to be sure there were no small children or dogs that might look like an appetizing meal to a predator that hunted monkeys in the wild.

The gust of wind from Snoke’s flight was thunderous but his wingbeats were eerily silent as he glided to land perfectly on the perch on the other end of the stage. There was an audible intake of breath from the crowd and murmurs of excitement filled the air. In the very back of the audience, his uncle watched them both, gaze sliding uneasily between Ben and the eagle. Snoke scarfed down the waiting rabbit meat and let out a shrill honk of displeasure that there was no more food.

Several people had laughed at the unexpected sound coming out of the magnificent raptor.

Ben had grinned, raising his gloved arm and whistling to call Snoke back.

Which is when everything had gone to hell.

The terror that had filled him to his very bones as he realized Snoke was flying – not to his glove, but directly at his face with the fury of ten thousand suns burning in his black eyes – had sunk his heart into the floor. He ducked, but not fast enough.

Pain the likes of which he had never felt erupted across his face and neck as one of Snoke’s razor sharp talons sliced through his flesh. The scream that tore from his throat was mirrored by the horrified crowd before him. He waved his arms wildly, base level instincts telling him to defend his face, and then Snoke was no longer on him and all he could hear was the frenzied flap of giant wings as Snoke took off once more and then – _and then_ – the bang, sizzle, and screech as one of the most endangered raptors in the world flew directly into live power lines and dropped like a stone, dead.

In the span of 30 seconds Ben Solo’s dreams had disappeared in a flurry of talons, feathers, blood, and sparks.

The whole thing plays back in a flash and Ben nearly sways on his feet, pulse hammering in his throat as he tries to claw his way back to the present.

“I didn’t ask you to meet me out here to talk about the past, Phasma,” Ben says, through clenched teeth.

 _She’s doing you a favor by even showing up,_ he tries to remind himself. _Calm the fuck down;_ _you can’t alienate the only person who actually picked up when you called._

“You’re right; let’s save that for sometime when we’re warm and dry,” she replies, shoving her short-cropped platinum hair, dampened by the cool mist, off of her forehead.

“We’re in the middle of fucking nowhere and it’s freezing. What’s this ‘game changing thing’ you said you needed to show me in person?”

Ben gestures back towards his truck with his head.

“Did you bring your bird?” he asks in return.

Phasma nods, uncrossing her legs and walking around to the back passenger door of her truck.

“She’s sharp today too, as you requested,” she says, opening the door to reveal the large wooden carrier that Ben knows contains Phasma’s Gyrfalcon, Captain. “Not that I’d ever left her fly free if she was overweight. I’ve put way too much into this girl to lose her now.”

He watches as Phasma pulls a heavy, worn leather glove onto her left wrist and undoes the latch on the front of the hawk box, listening to the familiar sounds of rustling feathers and flapping wings against wood before Phasma steps away from the car, now bearing a regal white falcon on her fist.

Captain is big, even by the standards of female Gyrs – who like most raptors tended to be around two thirds larger than their male counterparts. Comparable in size to a large raven, she sits quietly on Phasma’s fist, her pure white plumage – dotted with pale gray that fades to inky black along her back, wings and tail – ruffling slightly in the breeze. On her head she wears a customary leather hood, keeping her calm and settled even as Phasma transfers her from the cozy warmth of her box into the misty chill of the open air.

“She looks good for this late in the hunting season,” Ben says, _now_ feeling a little impressed despite himself, “almost feather-perfect still, which is quite an accomplishment.”

Keeping an active hunting bird from breaking or fraying feathers is always a tall order, but Captain looks as though she never leaves her mews. If this bird belonged to _anyone_ other than Phasma, Ben would suspect that was the case. But Phasma loves the hunt almost as much as any raptor Ben’s ever met so he suspects that she must just put in an exceptional amount of time on maintenance,

“Oh, I know,” Phasma replies with a self-satisfied smirk, as she wraps the braided nylon jesses that attach to Captain’s anklets around her pinky and ring finger before closing her hand around the loose ends, securing the bird in her grasp.

“I’m aiming to have the best looking Gyr at this year’s meet just to prove Hux wrong for saying you can’t keep them well in this climate.”

Ben smirks.

“Whatever gets you out of bed in the morning, I guess,” he says. “Speaking of which. Let me show you what I’ve been working on.”

He turns and heads over to the covered back of his pickup truck, pulling down the back hatch and reaching into the darkness for the large plastic case stored within. Phasma trails behind him, stroking a finger down the pale, feathered breast of her bird.

Ben kneels down in the wet grass and pops the latches open on the box revealing an assortment of neatly packed items inside.

“What’s this now?” she asks, peering curiously over his shoulder, “Some kind of new telemetry system? GPS tracker?”

He shakes his head as he begins pulling things out of the box and assembling them. “Nah; a few companies have released new tools for tracking birds in the last couple years. That market’s already cornered. I think the guys at Mando Radio just built an app that keeps track of so much data from their new transmitter you can tell if your bird shits at 5,000 ft.”

“Fun, but kind of overkill, in my opinion,” Phasma snorts.

Ben stands, turning to face Phasma with the device that represents the fruits of nearly a full year’s worth of labor in his hands. It’s a fairly standard quadcopter drone, just a little too large to fit comfortably in one of his palms. Its body is shaped like a fat ‘X’ with a set of propellers protruding from the top of each corner and sturdy, stumpy legs below. Beneath the body sits a clear plastic capsule, from which dangles a neatly wound spool of string attached to…

“Is that a _lure_?” She asks, intrigued.

“Sure is,” Ben says, shuffling the drone into the crook of his arm so he can hold the lure in question out for her inspection. It’s built much like a traditional lure: a piece of leather shaped like a bird with a space for a tidbit of meat to be attached. “But I can guarantee you’ve never seen one like this before.”

“Well now this _is_ interesting,” she says as she leans in for a closer look at the device. “Tell me how it works.”

 

* * *

 

Skywalker Ranch – home of the Organa-Solo School of Falconry and the Skywalker Raptor Sanctuary – sits near the top of Mount Green Peak, in the northern reaches of the Sierra Nevada mountain range.

When Rey finally walks through the ancient wooden gateway that brackets the entrance to the Ranch, the sun is just beginning to crest over the nearby snow-capped mountains and she cannot stop yawning, each massive exhalation causing a swirl of white as her breath catches in the air.

A long dirt road stretches out before her, leading to a small cluster of buildings set amongst sprawling farmland.

Largest of all is the white, weather-beaten barn: home to all the non-raptor animal residents of the ranch. Next to that sits the low, long building where Rey spends most of her day – the raptor facility. There’s an outdoor amphitheater nearby with rows of wooden benches and a small stage where flight demonstrations take place. The field off to the right of that has been sectioned off for guest parking with welcoming, wooden signs set up to direct incoming traffic.

Behind the barn and raptor facility sits the massive, rambling farmhouse. Painted the same shade of white as the barn, it shows it’s age not in poor upkeep but in the sheer number of renovations that have been tacked on over the century that the ranch has been in operation.

This early, it’s peaceful and serene. None of the day’s guests have arrived yet and while Rey can see a number of ranch hands moving with purpose about the property, the mood still feels calm and unhurried. The serenity of the pastoral scene around her is marred somewhat though, by the crowing of the ranch roosters and the sound of someone running a lawn mower far off in the distance.

She’s poorly rested and sore but thankful that Millie is sitting happily on her glove once again. Sure enough, as soon as Rey has tried calling her down this morning, she’d gone stright to the glove, to scarf down the proffered quail.

The falcon is quiet, feathers fluffed against the cold, bright yellow toes just peeking out from under her grey and white striped leg and belly feathers. Her steel-gray wing feathers gleam in the early morning sun, showing off the healthy bloom of her plumage, and speaking both to her good health as well as the amount of time and energy that Rey puts into caring for her bird.

A yawn that feels like it comes from the very depths of her ribcage escapes Rey’s lips and she covers her mouth with her free hand.

All she wants to do is get Millie back into her mews, without having to talk to anyone else, and then slink off to her room to sleep.

Unfortunately as she slips into the raptor enclosure through the back door, her bad luck from the night before continues. Walking into the kitchen, she sees Finn, already hard at work. Under normal circumstances she would be thrilled to see him. Finn, a licensed wildlife rehabilitator, has been at the ranch nearly as long as Rey has and he’s her best friend in the whole world. But Rey is in no mood for _any_ kind of socializing today and Finn is such a _morning person_.

He glances up from where he’s chopping raw chicken into tidbits for the day’s demonstrations. He takes one look at her and shakes his head.

“She wanted to sleep under the stars again, huh?” He asks, cheerfully.

“Uuuuuugh,” Rey replies, walking over to the other side of the kitchen where all the weight tracking tools are kept. The room looks like a cross between an industrial kitchen and a veterinary office. Designed for ease of clean-up and function over form, it holds all of the equipment for preparing food for the nearly 40 raptors in residence as well as the weighing station and some basic medical supplies. Despite its austere aesthetic, it’s still an improvement over being outdoors, simply because it’s heated.

Rey lowers Millie off of her glove and onto the scale with a perch attached to it. Millie steps backwards with no complaint, easy going as ever in her hood.

“One pound thirteen grams…” she remarks with a frown, as she makes a note on Millie’s weight tracking chart that hangs along the back wall next to those of all the other facility residents. “She felt and acted sharp yesterday but I think I need to drop her weight a little. She’s just not burning enough energy out there to care about any food that I have to offer after a hunt.”

“Yeah,” Finn agrees. “Weight management’s tricky this time of year. It’s hard to tell how many calories they’re gonna burn off staying warm, not to mention if they’re gonna eat too much of what they catch and decide they’re better off in the wild.”

“You’re telling me,” Rey groans. “At the very least I need to get this figured out before the field meet next week so I’m not the laughing stock of the CFA when she trees herself _a third time_.”

“Sorry Peanut,” Finn says, returning to his task, “Hopefully you can get her in hand soon. But next time you get stranded, give me or Poe a call and we’ll come wait with you so at least you you’re not out there alone.”

Rey scoops Millie off of the scale and turns to give Finn a tired, grateful smile.

“Thanks,” she says. “Hopefully this is the last time she pulls this sort of stunt for a while.”

Truth be told she _had_ considered calling Finn last night. But Finn’s girlfriend Rose is in town, visiting with Finn over her winter holidays from university. Rey just couldn’t bring herself to take him away from her.

And Poe… Poe is nice, but there has been that one time at a holiday party when they’d both been a little drunk and he’d tried to kiss her under the mistletoe and… well… Rey hadn’t really handled that so well. Poe had laughed it off and told her not to worry about it.

 _’Sorry, sorry,’_ he’d said, smiling and backing off. _’I thought we were having a moment. Guess I misread the vibe. Want anything from the snack table?’_

Poe had never brought it up again and his behavior towards her hadn’t changed so Rey _thinks_ they’re probably okay but… it’s not like she really has a lot of experience in that department to draw on and she doesn’t want to lead him on, just in case.

Rey fiddles with the ends of Millie’s jesses for a minute before she turns to face Finn’s back and asks: “What if I’m just not that good at falconry?”

Finn snorts at her as he scrapes the pile of chopped up chicken bits off of his cutting board and into a waiting plastic baggie.

“No, I’m being serious,” she huffs, “What kind of Master Falconer can’t bring their bird home at the end of _two_ hunts in a _row_? Han never had any trouble keeping her at the right weight.”

Finn turns around to level Rey with an incredulous look.

“You were rookie of the year at your first field meet as an apprentice. You won the Sky Trials – the hardest hunting competition in the US, I might add – with the smallest bird anyone entered, and you know as well as I do that Peregrines are tricky birds to wrangle,” he says, waving his knife around while he lists off his points. “You’re a _damn_ good falconer and Millie being a brat doesn’t change that. You got her right back this morning, didn’t you?”

“Alright, alright! Put the knife down Freddy Krueger!” Rey says, looking meaningfully at his hand.

Finn, glancing down at the knife he was waving around, blushes so hard that Rey can see it against his dark skin, and sets it back on the cutting board.

“Sorry, I just don’t like hearing you put yourself down when I know that _you_ know that you’re better than that,” he says.

Rey sighs, shoulder slumping a little, and she looks down at Millie perched on her glove.

“I know I’m not a bad falconer. Really, I do,” she says, stroking her fingers down the tawny, grey speckled breast of her bird. “It’s just that sometimes… sometimes I wonder if one day she’s going to leave and not come back. And then I think about what Han would do to me if anything happened to her.”

Finn nods.

“It could happen,” he says solemnly, “but somehow I think you don’t have much to worry about. She might be a brat but she’s _your_ brat. You’d figure out how to get her back. And you know that Han gets it too. He knows the dangers and risks involved with this sport better than anyone.”

The things that Finn is saying are nice, so Rey gives him a smile. But deep down, her _real_ fear still roils unchecked through her gut.

In truth, Rey has learned that while falconry is about hunting and the appreciation of nature, it is also about something much more fundamental. Falconry is the fine art of setting something free and hoping that you have proven yourself worthy enough that it comes back.

She chews on her lip, trying and failing to come up with a good response, and comes up empty. Realizing that she’s let the silence between them drag on for too long, she clears her throat.

“Well… I gotta get this girl back in her mews and myself into bed. I’ll see you later, okay?” She says to Finn. “Let’s keep going on our marathon of the Good Place tonight since I missed yesterday.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Finn calls after her, turning back to his work, as Rey heads out the far door and into the main raptor enclosure, which houses the majority of the raptors who call Skywalker Ranch home.

Personally, Rey likes to think of it as the bird stable, which is not an unfair comparison to make.

Along both pale oak walls are rows of neat wooden doors, tall enough for a human to walk through. Each door has a food chute for easy feedings, a storage shelf on the wall next to it, and informational dry-erase boards, featuring the name and relevant details of each mews resident. Beyond each door is a spacious, wood paneled mews, light and temperature controlled for maximum bird comfort. At the far side of the enclosure is another door that leads out to an attached weathering yard, covered by a plastic roof and kept secure from possums and other predators by sturdy chicken wire.

About halfway down the right side of the hall, Rey stops and unlocks the door bearing Millie’s name. She steps inside and removes the hood from her falcon’s head, tucking it into one of her coat pockets. Millie rouses happily, peeping and bobbing her head at the familiar sight of her home. Rey attaches her jesses to the swivel that connects them to the longer nylon leash that will keep Millie secure in her enclosure without getting tangled up, then gently nudges the falcon into hopping onto her favorite perch.

It’s a round block of wood, stained dark brown, with green astroturf on top. Rey’s pretty proud of it, given that she’d assembled it herself and it seems to make Millie quite happy.

“Just imagine,” she tells her bird, “you could have been here last night.”

Millie blinks her big, dark eyes and beeps plaintively at Rey, hoping for a treat. Rey sighs.

“It’s okay girl. We’re just going through a rough patch. We’ll figure it out.”

She then rinses and refills the wide, shallow bathing pan, gives her bird an affectionate scratch under her beak, and finally lets herself back out of the mews.

As she’s putting her gear away on the shelf next to Millie’s door, Rey catches a glance of the time on her watch. It’s just after seven. She has about five hours before she’ll need to get her gear back on and go out to teach an intro to falconry course to visitors of the ranch.

“Nap time,” she mutters, visions of her comfy bed and fluffy pillows dancing in her head.

Rey leaves the facility and walks across the grassy lawn towards the sprawling white farmhouse that sits towards the back side of the facility: the Skywalker House, and Rey’s home for the last seven years.

The house actually functions as something of a boarding house, sheltering the Organa-Solo family and the many ranch hands and raptor facility employees, as well as Rey. While technically none of those things, she is for all intents and purposes, all of the above.

The first time Rey had seen her home, she had been a scrappy, gangly fourteen year old. She’d slouched and scowled her way up the stairs, propelled forwards only by her ancient foster mother Maz, gently urging her on with a hand on her back.

 _You’re giving me away!_ Rey had wanted to scream, _You’re just like everyone else! You’re throwing me out! You’re_ leaving _me!_

She knew, even then, that this wasn’t quite fair but that did nothing to make her feel any better about the situation.

 _‘I know I told you that mine would be your last foster home,’_ she’d said quietly, sympathetically, for the six billionth time, ‘ _But the cancer is getting more aggressive and I won’t be here much longer.’_

Rey had been sullen and silent having spent the last week throwing every single argument and plea she could come up with at Maz’s iron-clad resolve with no luck.

 _‘These are good people, Rey,’_ Maz said. ‘ _Old friends who I trust. This will be a safe place for you to stay until you can take care of yourself.’_

Rey continued to stare mutinously away from Maz in silence.

 _‘Also,’_ her foster mother said, slyly, _‘they work with birds.’_

At that, Rey had perked up – though _only_ slightly. She’d long been fascinated by animals of all kinds, though birds had held a special place in her heart. She could sit and watch them for hours and on more than one occasion she’d ended up bringing home injured birds that she’d found and nursing them back to health.

 _‘I knew you’d like that,’_ Maz had said with a satisfied half smile, ‘ _Now come on; they’re waiting to meet you inside. I think you’re going to like it here_.’

Maz had been right, even Rey had come to acknowledge it once the pain of abandonment and the grief at losing the first person who had ever showed her kindness had abated somewhat. In the early days she’d often wondered if this place was just a fantasy that she’d cooked up, and she’d been terrified to like it too much lest it all fall out from beneath her.

Despite her fears, Han Solo and Leia Organa had welcomed her into their their lives without an ounce of hesitation, and Rey had quickly found herself falling into the rhythm of life on the ranch. She came home from school every day to help with chores on the ranch, tag along with Han on a hunt, or assist Leia with flight demonstrations.

And as days turned to weeks, and weeks to months, she slowly, tentatively began to call Skywalker Ranch her home.

When she turned fifteen Han had presented her with two things: her own falconry glove and the Apprentice study guide for the California falconry license exam. He had also presented her with a choice.

‘ _If you want to do this we will help you along the way,’_ Han had told her, _‘but before you take that test you need to be_ sure _you want this. Falconry is a lifestyle and as you've seen here it’s not an easy or clean one at that. When you have your own bird you will hunt on days when it’s freezing and you feel like garbage. You’ll scrub shit off of surfaces you can’t even imagine. Your bird will bite you or foot you and you’ll just have to put on a bandaid and deal with it. You’ve gotta want to do this more than anything else or you’re better off just sticking to casually volunteering.’_

 _‘I’m sure!’_ She’d declared without even a shred of hesitation, and Han had held the items out for her to take.

_‘Here you go, kid. Happy birthday.’_

Rey had smiled so hard that she thought her face would split and she’d read the study guide from cover to cover so many times that it had nearly disintegrated. In March of that year, she’d aced her exam with flying colors and – now with the official documentation allowing her to do so – began her training as a falconer in earnest.

Through the wide bay windows of the farmhouse, Rey can see a number of birds sitting on the indoor perches in the living room. A pair of hooded Harris’s Hawks, a fluffy Kestrel and a slumbering Snowy Owl. Rey knows that these are the day’s lesson birds. Leia always jokes that she likes to spoil them before they have to go out and work with people who don’t know what to do with them.

As Rey trudges up the steps, watching the birds beyond the glass, she can’t help but be reminded of the early days of her apprenticeship. She herself had spent countless hours sitting in that living room, holding her first bird – a Red Tailed Hawk named Jack – on her fist and pretending very hard that she did not exist, while the bird got used to her presence.

In the tradition of falconry apprentices Rey’s first bird had been wild caught.

 _‘The first year is hard for a raptor,’_ Rey can remember Leia telling her one evening as they sat together at the dinner table. Leia polished her worn leather glove with oil to keep it supple, while Rey shucked corn for dinner that night. _‘Most chicks won’t survive. It’s why as an apprentice your job is take one young bird and not just keep it alive but help it thrive. You’ll make that bird stronger, healthier, and a better hunter. You’re giving back by making the breeding population better.’_

‘ _But won’t it be tame if I’ve trained it?’_ Rey had asked, frowning. _‘What’s the point of that?’_

Leis shook her head, turning her glove over and eyeing it critically for any spots that she had missed with the oil.

 _‘The point is that unless it imprints on a human as an eyass, a raptor is never_ really _tame. They’re just… selectively handleable,’_ she said, wiping at a bit of invisible dirt in a seam. _‘At the end of your year with your bird, you’ll let it go and it’ll be wild again by the end of the week. These aren’t pets, Rey. They’re wild animals who are choosing to let us help them for a while.”_

Jack was grumpy and feisty, but he flew like a dream and by the end of his first fall they’d nearly cleared their closest neighbor’s farm of pesky rabbits. No matter how much manning and training she did with him, Jack had never really warmed to her beyond a sort of grudging acceptance that she made his life easier and was therefore worth hanging around with. She’d felt good that even if Jack didn’t particularly like her, she was still helping him get by.

She’d released him the next spring to go rejoin the breeding population as a healthy adult and had begun scouting out an American Kestrel nest having decided that she wanted experience with a smaller bird as well.

Her second bird, Saber, was a sweet yet tenacious female Kestrel who Rey had loved so much that she kept working with her all throughout her three years as a general falconer. Though she was now legally allowed to work with birds that came from breeders, she hadn’t been able to let go of her hunting partner until after she’d earned her master’s status.

She’d finally released Saber back out into the wild, trying to pretend that she wasn’t too broken up over it. It had been the right thing to do, though; it was long past time for Saber return to her wild state and to go have a normal Kestrel life. Besides, Rey felt emotionally ready to work with more exotic birds now that she had the option.

She’d expected to spend a few months working with birds at the sanctuary while she researched breeders for an Aplomado Falcon or perhaps a Sparrow Hawk.

What she had not expected was for Han to call her into his office two days after letting Saber go, and present her with the transfer documentation for his favorite bird, a stunning peregrine falcon named Millennia.

 _‘I’m not able to get out with her as often as she deserves any more,’_ he’d said, gruffly. ‘ _I think you might enjoy each other’s company. And… I know you have a lot of options about where to go and what to do now, since you’re an adult and all that… but… if you want to, Leia and I wouldn’t mind having you stick around with us. ‘Sides I know she’s yours now but I’d miss the old girl if you took her too far.’_

And that had been that. Rey had signed the paperwork through tears she didn’t even try to pretend weren’t happening, throwing her arms around Han in a massive bear hug before racing out to the raptor facility to see her new bird.

Every time she walks through the front door of the house Rey is struck anew by gratitude and astonishment that she’d escaped the wreckage of childhood in the British foster system and somehow ended up _here_ : safe, happy, and loved.

 _Things are actually not that bad,_ Rey thinks, forcing herself to take a deep, calming breath, _I got Millie back in one piece and next week I get five days of camping and fun at the meet._

The house is quiet, save for the snoring of the dogs and the rustling of the birds in the living room and Rey knows that both Han and Leia have undoubtedly headed out to their separate corners of the ranch to begin their work. All the same, the farmhouse radiates a familiar warmth and comfort.

Her irritation with her ill-spent night falls away and by the time she’s made it up the stairs and down the hall to her bedroom, Rey is more than happy to collapse into her bed, drifting off to dream about the next week’s adventures with a small, contented smile on her face.

 

* * *

 

Ben has first gotten the idea for combining drones with falconry while he was in the hospital, high off his ass on morphine.

During his training and research in preparation for his doomed experiment with Snoke, he’d seen and heard of other breeds of eagles across the globe being trained to combat drones.

As he lay there miserable and addled, trying to come to terms with the fact that he’d just become the laughing stock of the entire US falconry community – that his peers would never look at him without seeing a fool and a failure – the thought had crossed his mind that if a raptor would chase a drone then there was no reason it couldn’t be used as a lure.

Of course, once the drugs were out of his system he quickly realized that there were _plenty_ of reasons that siccing the average bird of prey on a drone was a terrible idea.

The drone could hurt the bird. The bird could hurt the drone. Drones were expensive. Drones were also not the natural prey of any wild raptor and while he might fight with his family about everything under the sun, Ben _does_ agree with his mother’s philosophy that beyond the process of manning a bird to the point where it could be handled safely, a good falconer should not be training that bird to do anything they would not do naturally.

So Ben had tucked the idea away and once he’d healed enough to get his stitches out, he’d abandoned the states for Saudi Arabia.

Falconry has always been a part of the culture in the Middle East, but in recent years the ancient sport had become something of a status symbol. Saudi princes and the _nouveau riche_ merchant class, many of whom who kept whole flocks of rare raptors in palatial facilities, wanted the clout that being a falconer brought them socially without any of the work and mess. Therefore they were willing to pay quite handsomely for well-trained foreigners to take care of the dirty business of feeding, exercising, and scrubbing up the mountains of bird shit and mutes – the undigested pellets of fur, feather, and bone.

Half a world away from the scene of his total humiliation and failure, Ben had slogged away under the blistering sun in equal parts self-loathing and obscurity for four years. But no matter how hard he tried to tell himself that this was what he deserved after everything he’d done, he couldn’t stop picking at the jagged emptiness where his insecurities about his place in the world of falconry sat, like a vulture picking a bone clean.

And then one day as he was sweeping up mutes and other excrement he’d overheard his employer, Sheik Hego Damask, talking about how he was paying $300,000 to have two endangered, wild-caught Gyrfalcons smuggled in from Russia and Ben realized that he just couldn’t take this any more. His Arabic was shaky, but it was still clear enough that in a week’s time there would be two more birds in the Sheik’s already overflowing and underused collection. The idea of leaving those birds who were so desperately needed to keep their population afloat to languish on perches for the rest of their days made bile rise up in the back of Ben’s throat.

He needed out. He needed an escape.

And just like that, his old idea had come calling once more. Only this time, the image in his head was not that of a bird chasing a drone, but instead soaring high above the ground, in hot pursuit of a lure carried by a drone.

 _If a bird was properly trained to target the lure and not the drone itself, it would be a perfectly safe way to quite literally take falconry to new heights,_ he’d thought, as excitement flared inside of him for the first time since his self-imposed exile had begun. Two weeks later, Ben had handed in his resignation and left Saudi Arabia for Seattle, Washington.

“I call it the X-Wing and I’ve been prototyping it since last November,” he tells Phasma. “It flies higher, father and faster than anything a human waving a rope around could ever achieve. And the best part is that because our birds are already used to chasing a lure, it doesn’t take much to get them to take to this. My Goshawk took to it right away.”

He turns it around and over for Phasma’s inspection.

“I’ve found a manufacturer and I had a website built,” he tells her as she leans in for a closer look at the drone itself. “It’s basically ready to go to market.”

“So this is certainly not what I was expecting when you called me and while _I’m_ willing to see what your little gadget does...” Phasma says, the look on her face fading from curiosity into mild reproach, “you know that no one has forgotten about the Snoke incident. There was a video of it that got out and it makes the rounds at least once a year. It’s going to be an uphill battle for you to get any American falconer to trust _anything_ you say.”

Ben gnaws on his lip.

 _Do you think I don’t know that already?_ _I’ve sunk every last bit of my savings into this thing, and if this doesn’t work I’m really and truly fucked,_ he longs to confess, though shame stills his tongue.

“I know,” he says instead, forcing the words out even though he’s nearly choking on his pride at being forced to admit _any_ weakness. “I’m looking for investors and the first order of business is getting someone respected to actually take a look at what I’ve done. Because I need someone to vouch for me to at the CFA meet.”

He can’t quite meet Phasma’s eye so instead he stares off into the misty distance.

“They’re the gold standard club in this country and getting the X-Wing accepted by them is the only way people will take it seriously. Take me seriously.” His hands tense reflexively around the X-Wing. “Which is why I’ve invited you out here for a demo.”

Ben’s jaw shifts in discomfort as his voice trails off. He’s barely copped to even a quarter of the shit that had gotten him to this point but he still feels like he’s given far too much away. Like he’s thrown himself prostrate before her and is now just lying there, waiting for Phasma to cast her judgement.

There’s an awkward silence that falls between them for a beat, then Phasma clears her throat.

“Alright,” she says. “Well, since we’re out here, let’s see what you’ve got.”

The corner of Ben’s lip twitches up and he lets out a breath of relief.

“Unhood Captain and I’ll show you,” Ben says, pulling out the remote controller from his pocket and switching the drone on.

Phasma frees her bird from the confines of her hood with practiced ease. The bird, suddenly seeing that she’s somewhere totally unfamiliar, bates a couple times, sending gusts of wind in all directions, before she settles back on Phasma’s fist. She cocks her head as she sees Ben retrieving a quail wing from his hip bag and attaching it to the lure.

“Looks like she’s already keen on that,” Phasma remarks, sounding fascinated. “That’s promising.”

“She might freak out a little when the drone first takes off, but I promise she’ll get used to it quick. It’s quiet at least.”

Captain, surprisingly, remains still as Ben’s thumbs press into the drone’s joysticks and the propellers whirl to life, lifting it off the ground. Instead, the Gyr’s attention remains focused fast on the lure.

He presses down on the joysticks and the drone takes off into the sky, lure still dangling close to the body, line tightly spooled up. Captain watches it go with interest and Ben can hear the creak of leather as her talons tighten on Phasma’s glove.

“I’m gonna take it to 600 ft, then let the lure out. That’s when you should let her go,” he says, glancing over to his companion.

“Got it,” Phasma says, unwinding Captain’s jesses from where they’re wrapped around her gloved fingers, in preparation for release. She grips them lightly, ready to let go as soon as Ben gives the word.

The height gauge on the drone controller’s visual interface hits 600 and Ben presses the lure release button. Even at this distance he can see a tiny leather speck suddenly trailing freely behind the drone.

“Now!” he says, and out of the corner of his eye, Ben see Phasma cast Captain off her fist and into the sky. The Gyr shows no hesitation and shoots off like a dart after the lure. Ben feels his mouth curling into an actual grin. He’s done this routine with his own bird _many_ times before, so he knows that his invention works. But this… _this_ is proof of concept. This is confirmation.

Captain climbs upwards swiftly, arcing wide around the field below, keeping her gaze ever fixed on her prey. Below, Ben steers the drone in a circle, dipping and rising, mimicking the flight of an actual bird.

The Gyr’s wings pump furiously against the air until she’s above the lure. Then she stoops, like a missile slicing through the air, going straight for the lure.

Phasma stares up at the display above them with one hand shading her eyes from the non-existent sun, mouth slightly open in genuine awe.

Captain misses it by a fraction of an inch and Ben grins as he speeds the drone up, circling in the other direction, making the Gyr flip over on the wing to match the new trajectory. He lets her make a few more passes, soaring and stooping and spiraling through the air. On her third near miss, Ben decides that the purpose of his demo has been fulfilled and Captain has more than earned her reward.

This time he slows the drone just a bit and when the bird stoops for the lure this time, claws extended, she strikes dead on.

From beside him, Ben hears Phasma let out a whoop.

“That’s my girl!” she crows.

The lure detaches from the line and a small parachute erupts from the underside of the leather bird, slowing Captain’s descent as the wind resistance from the feathers on a real bird would naturally. They crash down in the field about a hundred yards away from where Ben and phasma are standing and as Phasma takes off at a brisk jog towards her bird, Ben carefully brings his drone back to earth.

When they finally regroup some minutes later, Phasma hands Ben his lure back, looking at him with speculative admiration.

“So,” he says, “that’s the X-Wing.”

Phasma just keeps looking at him for another long minute and Ben does not miss the way her eyes linger on his scar. Then she shakes her head and sighs.

“Alright Solo,” she tells him, reaching out her right hand. “That was a pretty compelling case you just made for yourself. I’ll vouch for you.”

Ben’s face splits into an actual smile as he takes her hand in his own and shakes it.

“Thank you,” he says, “you won’t regret this.”

“Oh I certainly hope not,” Phasma says, letting go of Ben’s hand so that she can stroke the breast feathers of her bird, who is still tearing into the quail wing, “and if I do… well, I’ll just have Captain deal with you.”

“Fair enough,” he says.

Ben allows himself a moment to enjoy his victory here and even finds it within himself to grab a drink with Phasma at a local bar before they head their separate ways.

It’s only after he’s once more behind the wheel of his truck, heading down the Five to the motel he’s currently crashing at – a shitty little no name place with parking lot-level entrance so that he can sneak his own hawk box in and out without anyone noticing – that he remembers that there’s one thing he still needs to do before he shows his face at any CFA meet.

“God fucking damnit,” he mutters, picking up his phone from where it sits on the center console of his truck.

And with any and all traces of his former good mood firmly demolished, Ben calls his mother for the first time in five years.

 

* * *

 

Rey’s high spirits linger on after she wakes from her nap and carries through the rest of her day. Her classes go well and as usual Rey delights in the joy of people experiencing their first up-close encounter with a raptor. Best of all, when Rey brings in her evening meal, Millie is unusually affectionate, as if trying to make up for her naughtiness the night before.

“I know you think it’s fun to camp out but we’re gonna be doing _plenty_ of that next week,” Rey chides her bird, wagging an admonishing finger in her direction. Millie gives a little peep in return and fluffs her facial feathers out in contentment.

“You stop that,” Rey moans, “I just can’t stay mad at you when you look that cute!”

She gives her bird a little _scritch_ on the head that elicits some happy peeps, before heading back to the house, humming a catchy pop tune that had been playing in the radio earlier.

She’s got excited texts from Jessika and Snap – friends she only ever gets to see at meets since they live in far-off Southern California – about their plans for the upcoming meet and she responds to each one on her way, her own giddiness growing with every step.

For someone like Rey who had been both physically and spiritually homeless for so long, finding a community of kindred spirits means more to her than she can possibly express and the field meet is as close to a family reunion as an orphan like her could ever hope for.

She scrapes her muddy boots off on the shoe cleaning station and pushes open the farmhouse door.

A delicious smell wafts out of the kitchen, making her stomach growl, and Rey decides that she’d rather eat dinner with Han and Leia (and whatever of the ranch staff have decided to join them tonight) first and shower up later. But as she ambles into the large, open kitchen and dining room, she sees Finn, Rose, Poe, and Han all sitting around the table looking concerned as they watch Leia pacing back and forth, her phone pressed tight to her ear and a frown on her face. It would seem that despite the table having enough room to seat all 12 of the ranch’s regular residents, most of them have made themselves scarce.

“Well of course you’re _allowed_ to come, but–” She stops, obviously having been interrupted by the person on the other line. Leia is holding a cloth dish towel in her hand and as she talks she winds it tighter and tighter around her fingers.

She pauses in her pacing, glancing up as Rey enters the room, but remains focused on her call.

“No, this is just a surprise because it’s been years since you so much as responded to an email! I– yes, he’ll be there; he’s _the former president_. I just –”

Leia blows out a breath of frustration as Rey slides into the open seat between Han and Rose.

“What’s going on?” she whispers, looking around at the others.

“No idea,” mutters Poe, “but I’ve got a feeling that we’re about to hear all about it.”

“So I take it this isn’t exactly normal around here?” Rose asks, in a hushed tone.

“Nope,” Finn whispers back, keeping his eyes locked on Leia.

“I’m not trying to talk you out of this, _of course_ I want to see you! But… just promise me that if things go poorly, you won’t just use this as an excuse to vanish again,” Leia says, with unhappy resignation.

“Alright, okay, We’ll… I suppose we’ll see you there then?” She says, stopping her pacing to lean forwards, bracing herself against the kitchen counter.

“Okay, goodbye, I lov– oh, he hung up,” Leia pulls her phone away from her ear and shakes her head. “I swear to god, he’s gonna drive me into an early grave.”

“So…” says Poe, awkwardly, “everything okay?”

Leia turns around, ignoring his question and looking directly at Han with a mixture of worry and tentative, fragile hope on her face.

“Han, you’re not gonna believe this,” she says, “but Ben is back in the states. Specifically, this state.”

There’s a collective inhalation of surprise around the table.

“Huh…” says Han, before pausing to look around the kitchen with the desperation of a man who has no idea what _else_ to say and is praying that the answer is written somewhere on the granite countertops.

“That’s not all,” Leia continues. “He’s coming to the field meet.”

Just like that, Rey’s good mood vanishes like a soap bubble popping.

Because in all her years at Skywalker Ranch there was really only one time, one _person_ who had ever given voice to the nasty thoughts inside of the deepest and most secret part of her heart that say she’s an unworthy imposter who does not deserve all the good fortune and love that have come her way. That she really _is_ just a worthless orphan who belonged in the refuse where her parents had thrown her, not here in this beautiful home with these wonderful people.

And he’s coming to the field meet.

“Hey, Peanut?” Finn’s voice breaks through her whirling thoughts, “You good?”

“Yeah, fine. Totally great,” Rey replies in a voice that she hopes is in any way convincing.

“You sure about that?” Finn says, brows raised as he looks down at her right hand. “Because you’ve just torn your napkin to shreds.”

“Sorry, I just forgot that I need to… do something. Outside. With Millie,” Rey says, dropping the ruined napkin and scooting away from the table, before all but bolting out of the room.

Han and Leia are still staring at each other and doing their silent ‘we’ve-been-married-forever-and-can-read-each-other's-thoughts-now’ thing that they do from time to time, but Rey can feel the eyes of Finn, Poe, and Rose on her retreating back.

By the time she makes it out to Millie’s mews, she’s nearly having a panic attack. Her breath is coming in great gasps and she feels nauseous and dizzy. Rey drops down into the sand that fills the bottom of her bird’s enclosure and groans aloud, pressing her face into her hands.

Rey doesn’t know Han and Leia’s estranged son Ben Solo very well, but she hates – with every fiber of her being – what she _does_ know about him.

He’d only visited Skywalker Ranch once in the seven years that Rey has lived here but during the four days he stayed he had done everything is his power to make her feel the lowest of the low, the smallest of the small.

To make matters even worse, not only had Ben Solo been angry and spiteful to her for no good reason, but then he’d had the audacity to publicly drag the Organa-Solo School’s name through the mud before fucking off to _god only knew_ where, without so much as an email to his heartbroken and worried parents.

Rey _loves_ Han and Leia with every fiber of her being and the callous way that Ben had abandoned them has been salt in the wound for the last five years.

_‘He’s scum. No, lower than scum,’ she thinks. ‘He’s a bird killing, family ruining monster.’_

She had _ached_ for the way his abandonment hit her surrogate family, but at the same time Rey had been secretly, viciously glad that he was gone.

How _dare_ someone who cared so little about his incredible family, who was so willing to leave them and dismiss everything they’d done for him, come swanning in just to make her feel like she was the one in the wrong for being here? The less they all saw of him, the better.

Only now… he’s coming back.

Ben Solo, the looming figure in his black hunting gear, with his sneering disdain, and genuine belief that he was better, smarter, and more competent than anyone else, would be dragging all of his chaos and drama into Rey’s favorite event of the year.

 _The California Falconry Association doesn’t deserve this,_ she thinks, furiously balling her hands into fists so hard that her fingers turn white. _Han and Leia, with their eternal hope and unconditional love don’t deserve this. I do not deserve_ this _!_

And in her heart of hearts, Rey just knows that Ben _fucking_ Solo is going to ruin _everything_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we go! I hope you enjoyed the first chapter and I’m excited to share the next one soon!!
> 
> IMPORTANT NOTE: Falconry is incredibly cool and I hope that through this fic I will be able to get some of you excited to learn more about it and get involved with the preservation of birds of prey, because they are crucial to maintaining a healthy ecosystem! That being said: falconry is not a hobby, it’s a lifestyle. The laws in the US are strict enough to prevent all but the most serious and dedicated candidates from becoming falconers but that is not the case in many other parts of the world. If you’re interested in falconry do some research, visit a local raptor center, and try to spend some time with actual falconers before doing anything else.  
> For more information I recommend checking out [The Modern Apprentice](http://www.themodernapprentice.com/).
> 
> Falconry Terms:  
> Lure - A fake quarry used to train a bird, frequently tied to the end of a rope.  
> Anklets and Bells - falconry birds wear little leather “bracelets” around their legs for a variety of reasons, one of which being that it’s a good place to clip little bells which help a falconer keep track of their bird in the wild.  
> Hawk Box - A ventilated box used to contain a bird for travel.  
> Mews - An enclosure built to house a bird of prey. It can also refer to a group of these enclosures.  
> Sharp/Overweight/Fat - These terms refer to how much padding there is around the raptor’s breast or keel bone, which is a good indicator of what sort of mood a raptor will be in. If the bird is too sharp it’s dangerous because they’re too hungry, just right will be a bird who’s excited to hunt, and too fat could result in a raptor unwilling to return to the glove, or worse, one who is aggressive towards their falconer.  
> Jesses - Leather or braided cord “leashes” that are threaded through the leather anklets that falconry birds wear. They allow a falconer to safely keep control of their bird, much like a leash on a dog or reins on a horse.  
> Eyass - A baby raptor who is not out of the nest yet.  
> Rouse - When a raptor fluffs out their feathers. It’s a sign of contentment.  
> Bate - To flap wildly in panic or agitation.
> 
> Please don’t forget to tag me if you make something cool related to this story so I can share it in the next chapter!!!
> 
> As always, feel free to come yell at me about this story on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/commandercait) or [Tumblr](http://commandercait.tumblr.com) (even though I’m really not using it much since they’ve decided to set their whole platform on fire).


	2. Yarak

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woops! Sorry for the delay! Chapters should be going up much more regularly now, but the holidays ruined all my plans for posting. I'm gonna try for weekly Monday updates but it may actualy be more of an every other week schedule depending on how heavy my workload is.
> 
> My eternal gratitude to [cyborgharpy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cyborgharpy) and [VioletWilson](https://archiveofourown.org/users/violetwilson) for betaing this fic. I would be lost without them.

**Yarak**

> _Adjective_
> 
> A state of complete focus on the hunt. The raptor is riding the glove in anticipation and is ready to go.
> 
>   
> 

* * *

  


To say that Ben is not thrilled about returning to his old stomping ground would be the understatement of the century. Even just being back in California sets his teeth on edge, but there’s nothing to be done: he’s come this far and he’s just going to have to deal with it. The drive north on the Five is a monotonous straight shot past endless cattle-grazing land and truck stops, and even with his windows shut tight and the air recirculation on, the faint odor of manure has worked its way inside the cabin of his pickup.

His truck is loaded to the brim with everything that he’ll need for the meet. Three demo versions of the X-Wing, a small tank of propane and a camp stove, camping supplies and coolers of food for both himself and his Northern Goshawk, Silencer. The bird, for his part, rides quietly inside of his hawk box in the back seat; the rustle of feathers and the occasional jangle of bells are the only signs that the raptor is there at all.

All of Ben’s hawking gear is stowed in bags and boxes of the sort that were once quite nice but have seen many years of field work and travel and are now showing their age and wear. Given that the weather in the mountains is a bit unpredictable this time of year, Ben has packed everything from a rain shell to snow boots and he’s really as ready as he can hope to be.

Physically, that is.

Mentally he’s fighting the urge to turn his truck off the highway at every single exit he passes. L _iterally_ the only thing stopping him is the knowledge that the one scenario worse than facing the hawking community is being stuck in the vast, cow-shit-scented wasteland of Central California.

Ben’s phone rings right as he passes the Shell station that marks the center of the tiny town of Grapevine and he answers without thinking. It’s not like there are really a lot of people who call him these days, besides the endless barrage of robocallers that have materialized in the time since he came back from the Middle East.

He’s expecting either Phasma or her apprentice, a nervous, twitchy man by the name of Mitaka, both of whom have been in contact with him about securing a presentation spot at the meet over the last week. What he does not expect is to hear his mother’s voice coming through his car speakers.

“Ben,” Leia says, sounding cautiously excited, “how… how’s the drive going?”

He had known from the very beginning that going to a California Falconry Association field meet would necessitate some level of reconciliation with his family, but he hadn’t really counted on exactly how difficult that would be.

It’s not that his family had been cruel. It’s not that they had abused him. It’s not that he had grown up wanting for food or education or shelter or anything important.

But there _is_ an indelible truth to the fact that Ben Organa Solo, heir to the legacy of the Skywalker bloodline, had lived his whole life inside of a shadow that his family had frankly refused to even admit they were casting. He had been subjected to the questions and expectations from the very first time he set foot at a field meet about when he would finally do something to live up to his name.

And he’d tried, really he had. But it seemed that no matter how hard he studied, how many awards he won, or what exemplary condition he kept his birds in that it was never enough to please anyone. Ben’s apprenticeship had been a slog and the years that followed after had not treated him much kinder.

His first bird as a general falconer had not, as he’d hoped, been something nearly as exotic as his mother’s Golden Eagle or any of his father’s falcons, but at the time he’d been excited all the same to work with a raptor that didn’t have ‘started bird’ written all over it. The Harris’s Hawk had come from his uncle, Luke, who had told Ben repeatedly how wonderful, how clever, and how ‘ _unusually sociable_ ’ these birds were, setting his expectations sky high.

The hawk his uncle had presented him with had certainly looked the part. He was large for a male, with deep chestnut plumage and a belly still dappled with white, indicative of his status as a passage, or first year, bird. Russet patches covered his shoulders and legs, in a way that made him look to Ben as if he was wearing a matching suit jacket and trousers. The bird had a sharp, curved black beak set in a regal yellow face. Dark, intelligent eyes had tracked Ben’s movement as he approached.

 _Now this,_ Ben can remember thinking, as excitement rose within him, _is a proper bird_.

Of course, the second he’d held out his own gloved hand to take the hawk from Luke, the bird had gone into a frenzy, bating and flapping and screaming as though being tortured, until he’d worn himself out, and come to rest, dangling upside down from Luke’s glove by the jesses, looking helpless and furious in equal measure.

 _‘Meet your new bird. He’s a bit of a trouble maker but you two have that in common so I figured this would be a good challenge for you,’_ Luke had told Ben, grinning mischievously as he righted the bird and deposited him on Ben’s gloved fist.

And as Ben and the new hawk eyed each other warily, he’d had the first inkling of the fact that he might have been the victim of a bait-and-switch scenario.

Which is how he had found himself working with what must have been the world’s worst Harris’s Hawk.

Kylo Ren was a royal asshole who screamed incessantly, and suffered from such terrible food aggression that Ben had been bit _and_ footed more often than not when attempting to trade the bird off of his kills. His hands and forearms to this day bore testament to the violence inflicted by the Hawk.

And to add insult to injury, after four years of this terrible behavior, Kylo had eventually flown away mid-hunt, never to be seen again, no matter that Ben had spent the next week driving all over the countryside with his GPS tracker up, scanning the sky for any hint of his wayward hawk.

That was right around the time that he’d decided to call it quits with the US the first time around, exhausted by the weight of expectations that he just couldn’t seem to fulfill, his family’s endless ‘good natured teasing’ and utter blindness to his very real insecurity, and his burgeoning fear that he really was just the family fuck-up.

Even thinking about that part of his life is enough to sour his mood completely.

Despite everything, the true, bitter resentment that he’d harbored towards his family in his youth has mellowed somewhat. But there’s still a lot of water under this particular bridge.

“You there?” Leia says, when he doesn’t respond immediately.

Ben breathes out heavily through his nose before answering.

“Yeah, sorry. Driver in front of me was being an idiot,” he lies. “The drive’s fine, though. I’m ten minutes out from the turnoff for the Ninety-Nine and then it’s about another hour and a half to Visalia. If traffic doesn’t get bad I should be there around four.”

“That’s good,” Leia says, though Ben can tell by her tone that this is not what she _really_ called him to talk about.

“Did you need something?” He asks.

“Welllll,” Leia says, dragging out the last syllable of the word in hesitation, “I wanted to know if you were planning on staying at the campground or the hotel where they’re holding the banquet.”

“I’m camping,” he tells his mother, “I made a reservation when I paid my dues for the meet.”

“Well,” Leia says again, “Han and I are staying at the lodge because your father’s arthritis is getting bad and it really is getting too cold for him to be camping during the winter. But we did reserve an extra space just in case, so there’s a free spot in the School’s campsite if… if you’d like to maybe take that.”

Ben can recognize the olive branch that his mother is trying to extend to him for what it is, but… he’s not sure how he feels about it.

On one hand, his parents (and Phasma) are possibly the only people who will not be hostile on sight (or worse, just laughing behind his back the whole time – the Organa-Solos for all their faults have always been a laugh _in_ your face sort of bunch). _However_ , he’s still not sure how he feels about being in such close quarters with these people just yet.

There are _five years_ of estrangement and failure between him and his family and he doesn’t know how to negotiate that gulf. And, while his feelings about his parents are a mixed up mess of longing and resentment, his feelings towards his uncle are _far_ darker.

Luke of all his family members had actually realized that Ben was struggling under the weight of expectation and instead of attempting to shield him, he’d mostly given Ben a lot of stern lectures about how chasing glory made him utterly unsuited to be a falconer in the first place and was only going to end in disaster.

The fact that Luke had been right was just salt in the wound.

And Ben knows that it could be forty below and Luke would _never_ stay in a hotel. He’ll be right in the heart of the School’s campsite, just like always.

 _That old bastard would rather freeze to death in his WW2 issue tent than admit to any sort of weakness,_ Ben thinks bitterly, as he tries to refocus on the conversation at hand.

“I’ll… let you know when I get there, okay?” He says with a heavy sigh, “Thanks, though. For offering.

“Ben…” his mother says, tentatively.

“Yeah?” he asks, as he glances in his driver’s side mirror, flipping on his blinker and switching lanes.

“I’m glad you’re coming,” she says.

Ben sighs.

“Me too,” he tells her, hoping that he’s not driving right towards the second biggest mistake of his life.

  


* * *

  


Rey shuts the door on the trunk of her silver Jeep Patriot. She takes a deep breath of the frosty winter air, tinged with the scent of the nearby Redwood forest, and grins. This year’s meet is taking place just to the east of the Sequoia National Forest, in Central California. The weather is slightly warmer than up in the High Sierras, where the ranch is located, but the elevation here is high enough that a light dusting of powdery snow covers the ground and the way the cold nips at her nose, Rey would not be surprised if there is more to come.

In preparation for whatever the elements might bring, her little, dark green tent is set up over a tarp placed on a cleared patch of ground, secured to the earth by four sturdy stakes. She’s also put up the outer, waterproof layer to act as a wind-shield and extra insulation. Inside, mats, blankets and her thermal sleeping bag are piled in a lovely, cozy nest that will keep her nice and warm, even though she won’t have another body helping to heat the space up this year.

Finn, who had always shared a tent with her in the past is sharing with Rose this time, and while Rey doesn’t begrudge this arrangement, it did mean that she had to prepare a little more thoroughly than in previous years to make sure that she won’t freeze in the middle of the night.

Her Jeep is parked behind the tent, providing another wind-wall as well as a shelter for Millie and Finn’s bird, a male Kestrel named Stormy. The two are sitting snug inside of their individual hawk boxes. If the weather was warmer Rey would have set up a travel weathering yard for the birds – she’s got block perches and a pair of large wire travel crates in the trunk just in case the temperature goes up and the falcons need a break from the car – but as it is, it’s simply easier to keep the birds at their proper hunting weights in a more climate controlled environment.

“Hey, watch it with the logs!” Rey hears Poe’s voice raised in alarm, followed by the clatter of wood hitting the ground and peals of giddy laughter that unmistakably belong to Finn and Rose.

She looks over to see that the three of them are now collecting the dropped logs in question and stacking them neatly beside the fire pit.

“Sorry Poe,” Rose says, struggling to contain her laughter, “I promise I wasn’t trying to dump them on your foot.”

“Eh, it’s fine,” Poe says good-naturedly, waving her apology away with the hand not occupied by firewood. “I’ve got two feet, I figure I can stand to lose one.”

“He says this now,” Finn says, leaning towards Rose, conspiratorially, “but watch out; he’s gonna bring this up every time he wants you to do something for the rest of the meet.”

Rey huffs a laugh at their antics and glances around, surveying the rest of the Organa-Solo School of Falconry’s campsite. It’s a large, clear space surrounded by tall pine trees and sandstone boulders. The tents, cars, and trailers form an arc around the perimeter surrounding the fire pit and picnic tables in the center.

Her own tent is on the far left of the clearing, next to Luke’s rustbucket of an ancient, green Ford F-150 and the silver trailer that holds most of the school’s birds. Luke’s tent, which is somehow still sound despite being older than his truck, is backed up against the trailer for shelter.

He and Poe are sharing at Leia’s behest, much to Poe’s disappointment.

 _“I know you’d rather be off playing the camp bachelor Poe,”_ she’d said, _“but I’m half afraid he’s going to freeze solid out of stubbornness if someone isn’t there to look after him.”_

Poe sighed so hard that Rey had actually been kind of impressed by the volumetric capabilities of his lungs, but in the end he’d relented.

To the right of Luke and Poe’s set-up sits Finn and Rose’s bright orange tent, though it has yet to be fully set up. It’s still fairly early in the day, and at this point, getting the fire going is highest on the priority list.

Their caravan had left the ranch around 6 AM, and they’d made good time. Even with stops for food, gas, and to meet up with Luke near Sacramento, they’d made it to the Takodana Campground just after noon.

Han and Leia had unloaded their share of the supplies and food at the campsite before heading a few more miles east to the Chandrila Lodge where they were staying, despite Han’s protests that it was a waste of money.

Their absence could be felt in the empty spot on the far right side of the campsite, as well as in the lack of their usual banter and chatter, and it makes Rey a little sad. This is the first year that they are not camping with the rest of the School and even though she knows it is definitely the right call given Han’s age and health, it is yet another reminder that nothing is truly permanent, and things in her world are changing once more.

Rey shivers, suddenly aware of the chill creeping into her bones as she stands still, lost in thought.

 _Stop it,_ she chides herself silently. _They’re just at a hotel. That’s all. They’re not going anywhere._

She shakes her head, forces her lips up into a smile and strides over to help Rose – who has finally given up on trying to instruct Finn and Poe on the proper way to build a campfire – with the coolers of raptor and human food stacked on the picnic table. Rey has to take an extra large step to avoid tripping over Luke’s Jack Russell Terrier, Artoo, who is snuffling his way around the campsite.

“They have no idea what they’re doing, do they?” Rose asks with raised eyebrows as Rey approaches, glancing over at the pair of men, squatted and squabbling good-naturedly around the fire pit.

“Not a clue,” Rey replies, stifling a laugh, “But it makes them feel useful so I’ve learned that it’s best to just let this happen until they get too cold and give up.”

“‘We were Boy Scouts, we’ve got this’,” Rose mimics Poe’s voice, rolling her eyes and grinning. “‘Boy Scouts’ my ass.”

Rey doesn’t even bother trying to suppress her laughter this time.

Rose is still a new addition to the mix of people who Rey considers her family, but she’s a good one. The inconvenience of losing her usual tent mate aside, Rey is more than happy that Rose has decided to tag along to the meet this year. She was an online friend of Finn’s who had slowly become more than that over the last few years until they’d finally started making regular visits to see each other and admitted what everyone else had suspected: they were hopelessly crazy about each other.

It is a good partnership, both in terms of romance and lifestyle. Rose is a talented photographer who has designs on a career in wildlife photography. Although not yet done with her degree at UC Berkeley, Han and Leia had given their blessing for Rose to come out and work on the ranch if she was so inclined. They’d both liked the idea of having someone in residence to document the daily life of the facility and Rose had been more than thrilled to accept their offer.

“If Poe was _ever_ a Boy Scout I’ll eat my boots,” Rey says, just loud enough that Poe can hear.

“Get cookin’, baby,” Poe fires back, grinning. “You’re lookin’ at a proud Eagle Scout right here.”

Rey and Rose share a knowing look over the top of a blue cooler full of meat for the birds and burst into laughter once more.

“Uh-huh, _sure_. And _how_ long exactly have you spent trying to start that fire?” Rey says.

It takes another hour or so to get the camp fully squared away and they’re interrupted frequently by people from neighboring sites dropping in to say ‘hello’ and chat. Kaydel and Jessika swing by to drop off early Christmas presents in the form of baked goods and a group of three grizzled older men – who Luke refers to as his ‘squadron’ for reasons that no one has ever bothered to explain – come by to show off the new Cooper’s Hawk that the man named Wedge is flying this year.

Rey is disappointed to see that their neighbor across the way appears to be one of the only other Brits who regularly attends the meets: Armitage Hux. Despite their shared point of origin, Rey is pretty sure she’s never met anyone with whom she has _less_ in common. Hux is a nasty, pompous, uptight prick who mainly seems to be into falconry for the sake of collecting as many trophies as possible.

Rey can’t be sure that it’s him, because she hasn’t seen hide nor hair of the ginger man, but she doesn't know anyone else pretentious enough to drive an Escalade pickup truck. The prissy white tent speaks to the same sort of fussiness that Rey had always thought made Hux a very poor falconer.

She shakes her head at the campsite – one that would make more sense on a Pinterest board than in the winter wilderness – disgusted by the situation on all fronts.

Poe, on the other hand is eyeing their neighbor’s set up with interest.

“That’s gotta be Hux, right?” He asks, coming to stand next to Rey with a propane tank under each arm.

“I can’t think of anyone else dumb enough to camp like that,” Rey replies with a disdainful sniff.

There’s a gleam in Poe’s eye and his lips curl into a cat-like grin.

“I certainly hope it’s him; I got him a little… gift this year and it’ll be _much_ easier to deliver it if we’re right next door,” he says, waggling his brows.

Rey arches one of her own eyebrows at him in response, wondering if this is something she ought to be concerned about.

“Is this the kind of gift that’s going to make Hux better or worse to live next to for the next five days?” She asks cautiously.

“You’ll just have to wait and see,” Poe replies with a wink, before he saunters off to set the propane by the camp stove, whistling cheerfully all the while.

Rey has a very, _very_ bad feeling about how this particular drama is going to play out.

Making camp is a long process that involves a lot of lifting and hauling, but finally, as the shadows are beginning to grow longer, they’re all able to relax. They sit in their canvas folding chairs around the fire – which Rey built once Finn and Poe gave up – eating and making the same sort of idle small talk that tends to fill the air around the dinner table at the ranch after a long day.

Finn and Poe get into a contest, trying to see who can throw the most popcorn pieces into Rose’s mouth, while Rey and Luke end up embroiled in a conversation about how expensive snow tires have gotten lately.

Around 3 PM, Rey catches sight of Han and Leia as they come walking down the trail, arm in arm, with their dogs – Chewie, the easy-going chocolate lab mix, and Threepio, the anxious Vizsla – trotting along before them. Han and Leia move at an unhurried pace, talking and laughing and stopping to greet old friends, until they finally reach the campsite.

They look like a photo in a country lifestyle magazine, here, surrounded by the trees, in the golden light of the late afternoon sun. Rey’s heart squeezes fondly as she hears Leia’s throaty chuckle echoing up through the barely dressed branches above them.

Along with the dogs, the Organa-Solo’s have brought registration paperwork for everyone to fill out and a whole carafe of steaming hot coffee, which they’d smuggled out of the hotel.

“Oooh, you’re the best,” Finn groans as he wraps his hands around his tin cup, breathing in the steam from the hot, fresh coffee. “I’m so cold I was actually starting to miss that desert hell we went for the mini meet last spring.”

Rey bites her lip to keep from saying that, given how much Finn had bellyached about the heat at that meet, she sincerely doubts that he could _ever_ get cold enough to miss it.

Now that everyone is present and accounted for, it finally feels like Rey’s world is back in balance and her earlier melancholy seems miles away. _This_ is what she loves about field meets: camaraderie and quality time with her found family. Hot drinks on a cold day, a crackling fire and the sounds of a dozen different bird calls echoing throughout the woods. Peace and security.

“I think we’re going to have a good turnout this year,” Han says, pausing to take a drink of his own coffee, which Rey _definitely_ saw him pouring whiskey into. “I was talking to the new CFA vice president and he said we might even beat last year’s attendance record.”

“Is that so?” Leia asks absently, as she glances at her phone, before looking up and down the dirt road that runs through the camping grounds. It’s a motion she’s been repeating since she sat down.

“Yep. And would you quit worrying? He’ll show when he shows,” Han grumbles. “Here, have some whiskey.”

He pulls a metal flask out of his pocket and holds it towards his wife who gives him a flat, irritated look.

“One of us needs to be sober enough to drive back to the hotel, Han,” she says tersely, “And you’ll forgive me for being anxious to see _our son_ for the first time in _five years_.”

And that’s when Rey remembers the _thing_ she’s been doing her best to _not think about_.

Ben Solo, is _still_ coming to this meet, unfortunately.

Which proves that there really is no God, honestly, because if there was and he cared _at all_ about Rey’s happiness, Ben would have been arrested, or broken his leg, or _anything_ to prevent him from attending this meet.

A tense silence fills the air around the camp, punctuated only by the snapping of logs in the fire as everyone privately meditates on this subject.

It’s Luke who eventually speaks up, turning to level a pointed look at his twin sister.

“Leia,” he says, with a heavy sigh. “I know you’re excited to see him, but… you’ve had what? A couple phone calls with him since he came back?”

Leia’s smile turns into a glare as she rounds on her brother.

“We’ve talked about this, Luke,” she says and there’s an sharpness to her voice, like a hawk’s talons pressing down into a hand through the soft leather of a glove.

“We have,” Luke agrees, in a tone that’s trying for placating but comes out a little patronizing, Rey thinks. “But Ben’s always been… sensitive. And complicated. How do you know that this isn’t all about to blow up? You _know_ that no one else is gonna be glad to see his face at this meet and it could go south real fast.”

Leia stiffens, glare intensifying.

“The fact that he wants to come back here in the first place means that he’s a different man than he was when he left.”

“Be that as it may –” Luke begins, inclining his head towards his sister, though not relaxing the grim line of his mouth at all.

“Okay, listen,” Han interrupts the siblings, “I have my doubts about this – ow! Leia, don’t swat me!”

Leia turns her frosty stare on her husband and Han holds his hands up, placating.

“If you’d just let me finish, I was _going_ to say that it sure as hell _could_ go poorly, but he’s trying and…”

Han shrugs a little.

“He’s our son,” he finishes, in a quiet rumble that speaks of things he’s not able to conjure the words to express.

Once more, Rey is nearly overcome with the sick anger that Ben had walked away from his family, a family who is so willing to let him just waltz back in. It’s _galling_ how much he’d thrown away without a second thought.

“Is it really too much to ask that we give him this chance? If he screws it up, that’s on him, but I for one will not be the one to drive him off. I want to see my son again before I’m on my deathbed.”

She looks around the fire, meeting the guilty gazes of her brother and husband, as well as her employees, all of whom have been less than pleased about the fact that Hurricane Ben Solo will be making landfall on their meet, upsetting the balance and bringing the ire of the rest of the CFA down on their heads for even interacting with him in the first place.

Rey can’t quite meet Leia’s eyes. She’s all tangled up like a ball of yarn; her desire to see Leia happy is at war with her desire to punch Ben squarely in the jaw for everything that he’d done. Every missed holiday and birthday when she’d caught Leia staring at a family photo with wistful eyes. Every time Han called her ‘son’ by accident, then flushed with shame and made an excuse to be alone, elsewhere for a while.

How can she possibly tell this woman who has treated her like a daughter, welcomed her into her family, that her son, the only missing piece in her heart, doesn’t even deserve a fraction of the love she’s offering. Not again. Not after what he did to his family. To that poor eagle. To _Rey_.

Of course, this is the moment that a monstrous, black pickup truck with a ridiculous, shiny chrome grill comes growling down the road and turns into their campsite.

  


* * *

  


The first inclination Ben has that this whole meet is about to go wildly off the rails comes at the campground gatehouse.

“So you _don’t_ actually have my reservation on file?” he asks the bored-looking park ranger.

“We’ve got a _lot_ of reservations this weekend, sir,” the woman says, tone matching the expression of disinterest on her face. “We’re booked solid, actually. But none of them are for a Benjamin Solo.”

“My name,” Ben grits out, trying his hardest to keep a hold on his temper, “is just Ben. Not Benjamin. Have you tried looking for that?”

“Wouldn’t make a difference, honestly,” the ranger replies, flicking through a stack of papers that appear to be some sort of Excel sheet print out. “There’s only one ‘Solo’ reservation on here and it’s for a ‘Han’. Are you guys related or something?”

Ben has to forcibly keep himself from banging his head into the steering wheel.

 _Fucking perfect,_ he thinks, as he watches fate force his hand, _looks like this is a family vacation after all. Good thing mom already texted me their campsite number. Four times._

“Sir?” The ranger prompts when he doesn’t respond.

“Yes,” Ben says, in a tone that he hopes doesn’t sound like he’s about to come apart at the fucking seams, “I forgot the reservation was under my dad’s name. Can I go in?”

The ranger hems and haws a bit longer, demanding to see his driver’s and falconer’s licence once she realizes that he’s here with the CFA, but eventually she seems satisfied that all of his documentation is in order and presses the button to raise the arm of the gate, granting him admittance to the campgrounds.

He drives through the gate, rolling up his window and clenching his teeth.

This whole venture is already off to a _fantastic_ start.

True to the ranger’s word, the Takodana Campgrounds are packed with people, tents, dogs, and birds. As he drives along the dirt road that winds through the forested camp, he sees a few faces that he’s familiar with from his past life and the reality of what he’s about to do hits him hard.

It had been one thing, stopping briefly by the registration desk for the meet itself over at the Chandrila Lodge to check in.

There he’d only had to face Amylin Holdo and her assistant Snap Wexley, who had kept everything cooly professional, handing him his paperwork and registration badge with thin-lipped, impersonal detachment. It had stung a little to receive such a chilly welcome from people he’d known his whole life, but as Ben had shown up after the morning wave of early arrivals but before those coming to the meet after work later in the evening, at least he’d _only_ had to face the two of them.

This campground, on the other hand, is now home to somewhere in the neighborhood of 170 falconers, many of whom would love nothing more than to air their grievances with him.

Somehow Ben needs to convince a good number of these people that the X-Wing is worth their time and money, or he’s honestly, well and truly fucked.

In debt, financially ruined, no way out of this mess, _fucked_.

And _yeah_ , maybe it would have been better if he’d just sold this idea off and let someone else be the face of his invention. But this is _his_ and he _needs_ to redeem himself.

So he drives on, through the shadows of the towering trees, past campsite after campsite, until he finds the one he’s looking for. His mother needn't have even sent the site number to him, because it’s not like he could have mistaken the School’s campsite for anything else. Not with every single member of his family (and all of their starry-eyed lackeys) sitting right in the middle of the clearing, talking around a roaring fire.

True to Leia’s word, there is an unoccupied place on one side of the camp and it’s there that he parks his truck. Ben shuts off his engine and takes a deep breath in preparation for what comes next.

Silencer ruffles his feathers inside his carrier, reminding Ben that he can’t stay inside of his own box forever. Sooner or later he’s going to have to get out of the car and go talk to the family he ran away from.

He’s had quite a while, during his drive up, to really, _really_ think hard about what he’s doing back here. Because as much as he’d love to deny it, this _isn’t_ just about his financial future. Part of his return _is_ motivated by his desire to… come in from the cold, so to speak.

It’s not a comfortable admission, even inside the quiet of his own mind, made less-so by the fact that Ben, who has always been great at making messes, has no fucking _idea_ how to go about cleaning them up. He knows that while his family _definitely_ owns some of the blame for how his life has unfolded, the brunt of the responsibility for his choices and mistakes falls squarely on his own shoulders.

They might have handed him the sheets and blankets, but Ben is the one who made his bed and laid in it, refusing to get up, for five years.

So as he sits in his car, staring out his tinted windows at his family, Ben is honestly afraid that he’s just going to throw up as soon as he opens the door.

Silencer, who it would seem has had enough of Ben’s moping, lets off a round of high pitched calls from inside his box, nearly making him jump out of his skin. Ben looks back over his shoulder towards his bird, who is quiet once again, and glares balefully at the hawk box.

“Jesus, alright, I’ll get out, no need to scream at me,” he says, before rubbing a hand over his face with a groan. “I’m talking to my fucking bird. I’m finally losing it.”

Ben unclips his seatbelt, opens his door, and braces himself as a sudden blast of cold air that smells like forest and wood smoke blows into his face.

He’s keenly aware that the four bundled-up figures around the fire pit are staring at him with varying degrees of open contempt and curiosity, so he ignores them in favor of looking at his parents, both of whom have gotten to their feet and begun walking towards him.

Leia is all smiles, Han is more reserved. Ben’s mouth is like Death Valley in the high summer. His eyes are strangely prickly.

“Ben,” is all his mother says, before she throws her arms around him. Chewie and Threepio, who have followed his parents over to see him are winding around his legs barking and snuffling at him.

“Hi,” he says around a tongue that is too thick and clumsy to manage anything more than the single syllable.

Leia has always been tiny, although her sheer force of personality makes it easy to forget that detail. Even so, it’s clear to Ben that she has shrunk in the time since he’d last seen her, by the way the crown of her head no longer even brushes the underside of his chin.

The strength in her hug is just as fierce as ever. Tentatively, he wraps his own arms around her, looking up to meet his father’s eyes.

Han remains tall and broad, but his hair is pure silver now and there are lines in his weatherbeaten face that were decidedly not there when Ben left.

“Hey, kid,” his dad says, reaching out with what – had Ben not spent his whole life memorizing his parent’s tells – would be a very well disguised flicker of hesitation, to clap him on the shoulder.

Ben swallows thickly, and gives his dad a nod as he pats his mother a little awkwardly on the back.

Leia pulls back, and while she’s not crying, her eyes are definitely shiny.

“Oh, look at your poor face,” she says, reaching up to cup his scarred cheek with a bony, glove-covered hand. “That bird really did a number on you, didn’t he?”

“ _Mom_ ,” Ben says, in a voice that he hopes doesn’t sound as pathetic to everyone else as it does to him, because _of course_ his mother is bringing his greatest failure up _right away_. He can feel the flush of humiliation staining his cheeks and the tips of his ears, hidden beneath his too-long, dark hair.

“Sorry, sorry,” Leia says, patting his cheek, and stepping further back. “It’s just been so long. I’m so glad you made it. I was half afraid you’d decide not to come after all.”

Ben finally kneels down and lets the dogs lick his face while he pets both of their soft backs.

“Hey boys,” he says, scratching his fingers through their short, silky coats. “Alright; everything’s okay.”

The dogs are old now too, and it hits him like a blow to the chest that he’s lost _years_ and he’s never going to get them back.

“Not that we’re not happy to see you,” Han says, drawing Ben’s gaze away from the dogs, “But I’m a bit surprised to see you pulling up to our site. I thought you had your own spot?”

“I did,” he says with a grimace. “Not that the campground has any record of the $153 I spent to book it. Apparently my name isn’t on the list. Looks like I’ll be taking you up on the offer of using your extra spot, Mom, if it’s still open.”

“Of course it is!” says Leia, who smiles wide enough at his statement that the brief thought crosses his mind that she might have somehow orchestrated this on purpose.

But that’s the sort of uncharitable, suspicious thought that he’s going to need to keep to himself if he wants to actually rebuild any kind of relationship with his family. Besides, it’s far more likely that his credit card had been rejected on the reservation than that anyone had actually done this intentionally. He’s not exactly flush with cash these days.

“Come on, if you’re gonna be staying here you should meet the rest of the gang,” Leia is saying as she takes his arm and begins tugging him back towards the fire.

Ben’s eyes slide over to his father who is looking between his awkward son and his joyful wife. He gives his dad a small, jerky nod. Han pauses for a fraction of a second then responds in kind, and something in his posture loosens almost imperceptibly.

As Ben turns back to really _look_ at everyone else around the fire, the breath that he’s been holding since he stepped out of his car finally escapes through his parted lips.

He recognizes Luke, of course, and the curly-haired, bronze-skinned Poe Dameron who had been Leia’s apprentice back when Ben was a teenager. Luke is unreadable, but Poe is currently eyeing Ben like he’s a bird who’s just shat all over his favorite boots. The three remaining faces around the fire are new to him.

A young black man, wearing a warm brown parka and a look of suspicion is holding hands with the pretty, sharp-eyed girl in a green down jacket, who keeps trying to tuck strands of her trendy haircut back behind her ears, as she looks around this whole happening with interest.

The final member of the party sits directly across the fire pit from him, and the combination of smoke and heat distortion coming off of the flames makes it hard to get a good look at her, but he can tell, from the way that their eyes connect, that of all the people in this clearing, she’s the one who’s doing the least to pretend that she is happy about him being here.

There’s something familiar about her face, and he feels like if he could just get a better look at her, maybe he’d be able to put his finger on it, but –

“Well, well, _well_ ; nice of you to join us again, Ben,” Luke is saying, dryly. Ben’s gaze snaps away from the mystery girl, to look at his uncle instead. Against his will, and the mantra of ‘don’t let him get you going’ that runs through his head, Ben feels his hackles raise instantly. His mother’s hand on his arm is the only thing that keeps him steady.

“Luke, play nice,” Han says, as the grizzled man gets to his feet.

With a sigh, Luke extends his hand.

“Sorry. Old habits and all that,” he mutters, by way of apology. “I know it’s… not been easy for you to come here but it’s good to see you again.”

Ben takes his uncle’s hand, stiffly, and nods, not trusting himself to really say anything just yet.

His parents are one thing, but Luke… Luke is another.

“Thanks,” Ben finally mumbles, when his mom nudges him in the side, “glad to be back.”

“That’s Finn and Rose,” Han says, pointing at the cozy looking pair once Luke has stepped back and returned to his place by the fire. “One of our rehabilitators and our future staff photographer.”

“You know Poe, of course,” says Leia, pointing to the man, who carefully schools his features into something that resembles neutrality. “He’s been doing some work for us this fall, helping with all the birds during the hunting season.”

Ben nods a greeting to them and the three nod back with varying levels of enthusiasm.

“And that’s Rey,” says Han. “My former apprentice, though I don’t know if you remember her… you did only meet once.”

This is, of course, when Rey stands up. And Ben’s brain, which has been running in circles like an anxious dog since he arrived, screeches to a sudden, shuddering halt.

Because, oh _yes,_ he _definitely_ remembers her now. Though she too has changed in the years since he last saw her, from the gangly, scrappy teenager who he remembers feeling nothing but blinding jealousy towards, to… _this_.

Rey is dressed in a brown hawking jacket and dark gray hiking pants, and despite the inherent sexlessness of the garments, Ben can tell that beneath the boxy layers is a long-legged, willowy figure. The way she moves – with a predator’s casual grace – makes him feel a little weak in the knees.

She’s pale from the cold, which makes her freckles stand out against her creamy skin: a spray of stars across a brilliant sky. Dark brown hair, mostly hidden beneath a knit cream cap, flutters in the breeze like the downy feathers on a regal falcon. Her eyes are hazel green like moss, like the woods in spring, though the reflection of the flames dances in them, turning them to yellow-gold.

As she glares at him, Ben has the sudden understanding of how a mouse must feel as it watches death, in the form of a hawk, stooping down on it.

Truth be told, he’d done his best to put her (and their _incident)_ out of his mind in the time since their one and only horrible meeting, figuring that since he’d likely never see her again, there was little point in trying to apologize for his poor behavior. What good would it even have done?

Maybe he should have at least _tried_ to make amends, though, because here she is, staring him down across flames that could not burn as hot as her gaze even if they tried.

Ben shifts his jaw, trying to figure out how to navigate this unforeseen obstacle.

“Oh Ben, isn’t this wonderful?” says Leia, who’s looking around at the group before her, all oblivious smiles and delight. “It’s so nice to have the whole family back together again!”

He had expected the awkwardness with his parents, even the mild distrust from Luke. He’d expected the anger, the whispers, and snide comments that he’s sure to get once the meet officially begins tomorrow. But he had not expected _Rey_. It hadn’t even _occurred_ to him to expect her.

“Yeah,” he lies, as the last of his hopes for a positive experience at this meet turn to dust and blow away in the wind under the heat of her withering stare.

  


* * *

  


Rey’s not eavesdropping.

She’s _not_. She’s just… incidentally listening in on the conversation around the fire while she feeds the birds.

“So Ben,” Poe says, in a voice that is _oh so carefully cordial_ , “Leia says that you’ve invented some sort of… fancy new toy?”

It’s such a carefully crafted sentence, so perfectly designed to be equal parts insulting and innocent, that Rey is glad that her face is hidden by her Jeep so she doesn’t have to pretend she’s not delighted by this whole exchange.

She’d excused herself shortly after Ben had arrived, unable to make herself sit around the fire like everything was normal for love _or_ money.

“It’s not a toy, it’s an update for traditional balloon and kite tools for high-altitude training,” Ben replies in a voice straining with the effort that it’s clearly taking him not to snap at Poe.

“Eh, pot-ay-to pot-ah-to,” Finn says, “it’s a fancy bit of tech with a big fat price tag. What makes you think anyone’s going to buy into it?”

Rey watches Millennia scarf down a section of the quail they’d caught the other day, and tries not to wince when the bird just swallows a leg whole – bones, feathers, and all. It is, after all, what she was designed to do, even if it doesn’t look comfortable. Or appetizing.

“Because the traditional methods of training birds for high altitude hunting all have major drawbacks. This is actually not that much more expensive than a balloon or kite lure, but it will work no matter what your flying conditions and it goes twice as high. Plus the lure acts like a real bird, instead of just hanging there.” Ben speaks like he’s explaining something to a particularly dim toddler.

Rey rolls her eyes. It would seem that the years have done little to dull his arrogance.

Other things have changed though, in ways that Rey had neither considered nor been prepared to deal with.

For instance, Ben, who had always been tall, has now filled out and bulked up, so that he gives the impression of having much more in common with one of the massive redwood trees than a normal human being.

He’s also… well. He’s certainly grown into his features. The prominent nose and mouth set in a permanent pout now seem like they belong in the strong-jawed, regal-browed face that only a few years before had looked so… disproportionate. Before, he’d looked like he’d been put together from spare parts by an alien who didn’t understand how a face was supposed to work. She had wondered for a long time, how two people as attractive as Han and Leia had produced such a strange looking child, and it appeared that the answer was just that Ben needed to grow out his hair and eat more protein.

Rey _really_ does not like this new development.

It was bad enough hating him when he looked like a nasty, sneering loser in her memory. Hating him now that he looks like he walked right out of some sort of lumberjack romance daydream, is far more inconvenient.

Once Millie and Stormy have been taken care of, Rey heads into the bird trailer to feed the rest of the flock, the insulated walls muffling the conversation by the fire for a while. She goes through the motions, weighing and feeding each bird one after the other and stroking breast feathers and wings, checking to make sure that everyone made it to camp in good condition.

When Rey finally emerges from the trailer the sky is beginning to grow dark and conversation around the fire has moved on to new topics. It seems that there has been something of a shift in tone. The undercurrent of hostility that everyone had been radiating appears to have dissipated and now chatter rolls along smoothly, with Ben chiming in occasionally, sounding for all the world like he does this every night.

Rey tries not to be too curious about what she missed that has wrought this change in mood. Ben, clearly, must have said _something_ to make everyone stop giving him a collective stink-eye.

 _Great,_ she thinks, scowling, _apparently he’s charming now too._

As she rejoins the group at the fire, disinfecting her hands with an antibacterial wipe, she’s at least slightly mollified to see that Luke is still watching his nephew with a wary expression.

“Ben, you should put your tent up before it gets too dark,” Leia says and Ben nods, before getting up and walking back to his monstrosity of a truck.

The conversation around Rey moves on, turning to tomorrow’s schedule and the various people that everyone is hoping to meet up with.

Leia and Poe get up to make dinner, over at the picnic table and grill, and Rey can distantly hear the sound of them talking about the lecture for prospective apprentices that they’re giving in the morning.

She keeps quiet, not feeling much like making small talk. She knows that it would just be so much easier to let all of this go and pretend that everything is fine and that Ben Solo doesn’t matter.

But… she can’t shake the feeling that this is a disaster waiting to happen, so she watches him surreptitiously, because _someone_ has to.

 _It’s just keeping tabs on him in case he does something,_ Rey thinks, even as she knows that’s a complete lie.

She watches him over the rim of her now heavily doctored and extremely alcoholic coffee, as he digs, with increasingly frantic energy, through his stupid, ugly truck, searching for something.

After what must be a solid fifteen minutes of this, he pulls back. In the fading sunlight, Rey can see that his whole, enormous mountain man frame is coiled tight with rage. She’s bracing for an explosion, when he just… _stops._

Ben takes a deep breath that makes his chest expand like a bellows, tipping his head back, eyes closed. He breathes slowly, in and out. Rey’s own breath catches in her lungs. She feels as though she’s witnessing something _private_. It’s… strange. There’s a purposeful stillness to him, an active defusing of his own tension in this moment that makes her almost uneasy.

 _This_ is not the Ben Solo she remembers.

Her gaze lands on the sharp point of his Adam’s apple. She licks her lips. Then she remembers who she’s looking at and wants to smack herself.

He might have everyone else fooled but she refuses to be drawn in. No matter how much yoga breathing he’s doing or self restraint he’s practicing right now, she knows that inside of him is still the nasty streak a mile wide and she’s not about to let him hurt her again.

Ben turns and Rey’s eyes snap back to the fire before he can catch her staring. He’s so damn _big_ that she can see him stalking back towards the fire pit, all the same.

“So,” Ben says, voice drawn tight with aggravation, “it looks like I’ve forgotten my tent poles.”

“Shit, kid,” says Han, with a surprised laugh, “this just isn’t your trip, huh?”

Ben’s ears, peeking out from his rumpled hair, turn a furious red.

“It… certainly doesn’t seem like it,” he says, scrubbing his hands over his face with a heavy sigh.

“Well, that’s okay,” Han says, clapping Ben on the arm, “The lodge is all booked up, otherwise I’d just say that you could get a room there, but don’t worry, we’re not gonna leave you out in the cold.”

The bottom drops out of Rey’s stomach as she realizes what Han is about to suggest.

“We actually have an extra tent spot this year, since Finn and Rose are bunking together, isn’t that right, Rey?”

 _Fuck_ , she thinks.

“I don’t think that’s a very good idea,” she says, through clenched teeth.

Han frowns at her, clearly taken aback by her response.

“What? Is it because Ben’s a guy? You’ve never minded sharing with Finn,” he says, looking baffled by her sudden resistance.

“He’s… he’s too big,” Rey says, because she _literally can’t think of anything else_ that isn’t just spilling all of her vitriolic rage at Han and his newly reunited son.

Rose snorts and Rey shoots her a glare. Her friend gives her a helpless look and pinches her lips together, but there’s still mirth dancing in her eyes.

Han and Ben both look doubtfully over at the tent in question.

“There’s plenty of room, Rey. It’s a two man tent and you’re pretty small –” Han says, but Rey just _can’t_.

“I just don’t want to share, okay? It’s not my fault he didn’t pack well,” she snaps, with more bite than she intends and she _hates_ herself for the flash of surprised hurt that crosses Han’s face in response.

“Rey,” Han says, frowning.

“Just drop it, dad,” Ben interrupts, making everyone start. He’s been so quiet and still throughout this exchange that they had all but forgotten that the very person they are arguing about is even there in the first place.

“Ben…” Han begins, frowning.

“I’ll sleep in my truck,” Ben says, tightly, not looking at Rey.

His words catch her off guard.

 _What is your angle,_ she thinks, because the Ben Solo that she knows would _never_ willingly inconvenience himself for _anyone,_ least of all Rey. Deciding that it doesn’t matter what game he’s playing because she’s just not interested in his bullshit, Rey gets to her feet and says:

“Great. He’ll sleep in his car. See, everything’s fine,” then she stomps off towards her tent, keenly aware that everyone around the fire is watching her with raised eyebrows.

Everyone, that is, except Ben, who is staring off into the forest with a miserable expression on his face.

  


* * *

  


When Ben had volunteered to sleep in his truck, it had been more of an act of immediate self-preservation than anything else. All he’d wanted to do was extricate himself from any situation that might result in him stuck in close quarters with the pretty girl who looks about three seconds from stabbing him at any given time.

He hadn’t considered the reality of what he was signing himself up for. He’s not exactly small and his truck isn’t designed to sleep a full grown man when it is empty, much less when it’s packed to the gills with now useless camping gear and a live hawk.

But night has fallen and people are retreating into the tents to sleep in preparation for the beginning of the meet in the morning. His parents have long since departed for their hotel, leaving Ben alone in the company of near strangers who, while they have warmed to him slightly, still don’t really like him, and an uncle who seems to be watching him for signs that he’s about to produce another Harpy Eagle from his pockets. And then there’s Rey, whose abrupt departure from the fire pit had left everyone gawking at him in confusion.

 _Isn’t that just the way of things around here,_ he’d thought, bitterly. _Even when I’m not the one losing my temper, I’m_ still _to blame._

Ben sighs and shakes himself free of his brooding, getting back to the task at hand: figuring out how exactly he’s going to manage to sleep in his truck.

He’s brushed his teeth and done his nightly grooming in the campground’s bathroom, changed into sweats for the night, and he now stands outside of his truck, sleeping bag tucked under one arm. Silencer’s box is too big to move from the back bench into the front seat, so it’s looking more and more like Ben is going to be sleeping, sitting up, in the driver’s seat.

 _Fucking perfect_ , he thinks.

In the morning he’ll go investigate other hotel options in the area, but for tonight at least, he’s going to have to make do.

Someone clears their throat behind him, and he jumps.

Ben turns around and much to his surprise, it’s Rey who stands before him. She too is dressed for sleep, in flannel pants and a thick sweatshirt. Her feet are shoved into a pair of hiking boots and she’s still wearing her knit cap. She should look ridiculous, but in the light of the slowly dying campfire, she looks ethereal.

“Why did you offer to sleep in your truck?” Rey asks, and it’s the first thing she’s said to him since he arrived that is not openly hostile. She stands close, speaking in a low voice and Ben gets the sense that she’s very much trying to keep this between the two of them.

Ben rubs a hand across his jaw and rolls his eyes.

“I would have thought it was pretty obvious,” he says, matching her volume. “You clearly didn’t want to share and it was making you upset.”

Rey’s eyes rove over his face, like she’s trying to decode some sort of hidden message in the slant of his brow or the line of his mouth.

“Not like you’ve ever cared about that before,” she says, lip curling.

Ben shifts uncomfortably, trying to figure out how to respond, but before he gets the chance, Rey speaks again.

“Do you even know why I’m mad at you? Do you remember what you said?” she grits out, after a long moment. The words escape along with the cloud of her breath, drifting up towards the starry sky visible through the branches above their heads.

Ben, for his part, has spent the better part of the evening trying to figure out this exact thing. No matter which way he turns his memories of her over in his mind, he can’t figure out why Rey is still so angry so many years later. It just doesn’t make any sense.

They’d really only interacted the one time.

And, well, he’d been rude and needlessly cruel to her. He’d been looking for an outlet for his rage and she’d fallen right into his path.

But surely one small fight with a near stranger five years before didn’t merit the sort of murderous hostility that Rey was directing towards him. Even his blood relations, who had the most cause for legitimate grief with him had never expressed anger like _this_.

“I remember being a dick to you, when I visited the ranch,” he says, carefully, “I think I called you a ‘shitty falconer’? Which I’m sorry for saying, by the way.”

Somehow Rey’s expression grows even more thunderous.

“You think I’m this angry because you insulted my skill as a _falconer_?” she hisses, stepping right into his space and jabbing a finger into his chest. “You really – you really think I’m that shallow?”

Ben’s eyes widen and he takes an involuntary half-step back from her.

“I– I don’t _think_ anything about you,” he says. “I don’t _know you_.”

“No you don’t,” she spits. “And you didn’t know me five years ago either.”

“Rey…” he says, shaking his head, “I’m sorry, I just don’t–”

“You called me a _scavenger_ ,” she snarls, loud enough that Finn and Rose glance up at them from the fire, and Rey drops her voice once more, clenching her hands into fists, “You said I was nothing! You stormed into the room out of nowhere and accused me of trying to _steal your family_.”

Ben’s mouth drops open as the memory finally hits him, all the fragments of his bad behavior he’d tucked away into his subconscious washing over him in a torrent of icy cold shame.

 _‘Hey, Ben, right? Your dad has told me so much about you! It’s nice to finally meet you,’_ she’d said, offering him a wide, bright grin as she turned away from the freshly-caught rabbit she’d been cleaning to greet him when he came through the door of the raptor facility kitchen.

Ben had frozen in place for a split second, as he realized that his attempt at an escape from his family had led him straight into something _far_ worse: _the girl_ he’d been hearing about non-stop since he’d come home.

He’d looked at her, really looked at her, trying to see what it was about her, this _Rey_ girl, that made her so special, so different. What she had that he didn’t. What made his parents love her the way that they’d never been able to love him.

She was a scrawny thing wearing a too-big t-shirt and denim shorts. There was a smudge of dirt on her nose and a bandaid on one of her knees. There was _nothing_ special about her.

Something snapped inside of his chest and he saw red. How dare this insignificant scrap of a girl stand here, as if she belonged, making the family that he’d never failed to displease so happy in his place?

 _‘Looks like they’re just letting anyone get a falconer’s license these days,’_ he’d sneered.

 _‘Wh-what?’_ Rey’s brow creased in confusion. Vaguely Ben had registered that she couldn’t be more than fifteen. Just a kid. But it didn’t matter; he was a bomb ready to explode and his timer had just gone off.

 _‘You heard me,’_ Ben spat, _‘You’re a shitty falconer, like every other scavenger who’s come along, looking for a scrap of my family’s fame. You’ll never be good enough for my parents. And when you finally figure that out, they’ll disappoint you just as badly as you’ve disappointed them.’_

 _‘I– I–’_ Rey had tried to speak, but his attack had come in so swift and unprompted that she was utterly defenseless in the face of it. It was an emotional knee to the gut and Ben had been viciously gleeful, watching the knife drop from her nerveless fingers as tears began to well in her eyes.

Then he’d stormed past her into the facility, trying to convince himself that tearing Rey down to size had actually done anything to make him feel better.

Ben screws his eyes shut and groans, dropping his face into his hands.

“Fuck,” he says.

“Yeah,” she replies, eyes boring holes into him.

“I’m… I don’t even know what to say for myself,” he says.

“Sorry would be a good place to start,” Rey replies, icily.

“I am,’ Ben says, emphatically. “I was… I was horrible to you and you didn’t deserve that. I’m sorry, Rey.”

She doesn’t respond for a while, but her fists fall to her sides, uncurling as they do.

She looks down at the ground next to his left foot.

“Do you know what the worst part was?” she asks, and her voice is rough, like she’s barely keeping her composure.

Ben shakes his head.

“The worst part is that _right after_ you said all of those horrible things to me, you walked out on your family. You threw them away like they were _garbage_ ,” she sucks in a breath, shaking her head. “And now, after all this time, after all the heartache you’ve caused the people who _love_ you even though you _do not_ deserve it, you just get to come back and it’s like none of that ever happened.”

Ben feels like he’s been punched in the solar plexus. He can’t even speak. He just stares at her, dumbstruck.

“Why _did_ you come back?” she asks, quietly, “And don’t say your drone because you could have sold that off somewhere else for way less trouble. I know there’s more to it than that.”

Ben takes a deep breath.

“I’m trying to fix what I broke,” he says at last, the words coming up like groundwater slowly making its way to the surface. He feels raw and wretched from the admission, from this conversation, from his whole life, if he’s being honest. “I was a shitty son, and an awful person, but I’m trying to be better.”

“You don’t _deserve_ a second chance,” she says.

“I know,” Ben replies, looking down as shame courses through him.

In the trees above them, an owl lets out a hoot and the mournful call makes both of them start.

Rey sighs hard.

“You’re too big to sleep in your truck. Your back will get all fucked up if you do,” she says at last. “You can share my tent for tonight, just… don’t touch anything.”

Then she turns and begins walking back towards her tent. When she’s about halfway there, she turns to look back at him, raising her eyebrows as if to say, _‘coming?’_.

Ben, follows after her, in a daze, the emotional whiplash of the last few minutes having left him almost motion sick. He’s keenly aware of the fact that Finn and Rose are watching them from the fire pit, eyebrows raised with curiosity, but he doesn’t look at them.

After all, it’s not like he has any better understanding of what exactly has just transpired than they do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now the real fun begins! Next chapter: bird shenanigans and the perils of tent sharing.
> 
> Falconry Terms:  
> Food Aggression - When a raptor lashes out, trying to protect it's catch from "competition". This is problematic behavior in a falconry bird because it can be extremely dangerous for the falconer.  
> Footing - To grab something with the foot and talons; this action is done to a lure or quarry to subdue or kill it. When a raptor attacks a falconer with its talons, it is also called footing.  
> Bate - The action of the bird attempting to fly from a perch or the fist while attached by a leash.  
> Weathering Yard - A place where a raptor can sit safely on its perch in the open air and sunshine.  
> Balloon and Kite Lures - the precursors to Ben’s drone lure. Tools designed to hold a lure up in the sky to train a bird at higher altitudes.
> 
> Please don’t forget to tag me if you make something cool related to this story so I can share it in the next chapter!!!
> 
> As always, feel free to come yell at me about this story on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/commandercait) or [Tumblr](http://commandercait.tumblr.com) (even though I’m really not using it much since they’ve decided to set their whole platform on fire).


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